Au gratin ... with Cheese!

Yes, that is the same thing. No, it's not supposed to make sense. Well, unless you're family, in which case it makes all to much sense.


New wallpaper, needed something cooler for this sweltering heat.

Don't like the way these new headphones rest on my ears, though the mic isn't nearly as bad as the old one had gotten.

(Disgaea)
Did some empowering via Item World to crank out a pair of level 50 Infernal Armors, an 80 Infernal Armor (80 Base, 107 after affects), a 50 Beam Axe, and have a few Exaliburs and Satan's Motors slated as well as a couple more Infernals. Was using Teachers (just a 40 atm) to boost a trio of Dietician, Gladiator, and Coach - the three I had at the highest base - but have swapped over to an 80 Mediator to breed Sniper children for Cammy and Erika (Axe Beastmaster and Bow Thief) owning to the value of Hit in both of their abilities (the Beam Axe is -1700 baseline).

Gathered the Prism Ranger Pirates in the deepest of the armor trips, so that puts me at 15/16 on Maps, just lacking the damnable Animal Pirates despite several trips through the 21-40 range. Maxed on Female Warrior Lovers however I haven't really attempted to get any of the rest of them up, though Thief is at the top of my list. All the armors have triple Move boost just because it seemed the most logical choice at the time, I wasn't going for stat maxing with stacked Sentries anyways so I didn't see the need to enhance growth. Have 7 Collectors from Item World trips though, so I'm all set for Rarity matching when the time comes.

Ares (Male Warrior) is pushing level 2600 with 180K Attack, 200K Armor, and almost 570K Health. He's got the most Felonies of all my criminals however I've got no clue on the precise amount, probably not at the 300 cap yet but I have no good way of knowing except by doing the math, and really I'd rather just assume he's only got 150 or so and build on that to be safe.

Minerva (Female Warrior) finally got up to above 1000, at about 1400 right now. 300K Defense and Health with a respectable 160K Attack that's mostly driven by the level 80 Infernal since she's only got a Legendary Gaia Spear. No one seems to have any Holy Longinuses (Longini?) at the Rare rank, let alone Legendary. The fact that her only static maneuvers are Turbulence or Divine Strike is kinda weak though, since she's either Wind Reliant or single target. Spear Storm and Avalanche just don't hold it on smaller stages where I can't get the opening to use them.

Cammy (Beastmaster) has a twice range-increased Axe that gives her alot of opportunity to
counter and destroy targets that wouldn't normally be hers to hit. Anything at max range in a straight line is still Boomerang Axe fodder though. 200K attack, but without an Infernal her other stats are way behind, barely pushing 10K-30K, since her gear is sorta dated as well. Almost at 1000 though.

Erika (Thief) rounds out the powerhouses (yeah, I didn't level Adell, nor a Fist user, nor any Monsters, nor a Gun user). She's nearing 2000, but until I cap her lovers she's only got a 1.3x level range on stealing, which makes the bottom-grade pirates nigh untheftable at deeper items because of their high level multipliers capping them quickly.

Hopefully I'll have another largish anime post forthcoming now that I'm deep into Death Note (26 through)

July Heat

Rabbit rabbit. (I wonder if that's a wiki-able superstition -- heh, guess so)

Nothing to add just yet, or at least nothing that I've substancialized into a formal post yet. Lunch today rocked, Marathoning 10 Eps of Gurren Lagann rocked, end of story.

It's not Fallen Angel Flonne, but oh well.

Happy Flonne. My new near-Summer wallpaper. Makes me smile every damn time I minimize everything to the Desktop. Also one of the select few pictures of the second batch that I'm truly happy with, the rest violate some of my minor tenants of picture choice but are well enough done for me to have said "aw hell" and saved anyways.

I'm fairly certain Diana is convinced I don't know how to navigate, but in my defense I only got lost twice, and both times it was because the lovely state of California decided that labeling cross streets wasn't a necessity so I don't find myself to be the guilty party here.

Okay, so the 90 minutes of packaging has set my schedule back a great deal, but I'm going to publish this regardless of what else ends up being poured into it. And I'll be damned if Flonne there doesn't cheer me up every time (that's the heart of a good wallpaper right there).

Not gonna blog California yet, though I have more of a weekend than I'm accustomed to and I've already burned most of the anime resevoir (I'll have to flip a coin to figure out what series dies off to make room for a Gurren Lagoon marathon in week or so, but till then I'm kinda low) since my return on Thursday. So just a few quick thoughts based on another 1-2 episodes (depending on if I read Jiaz's posts on the topics or not) of the series.

Idolmaster -- I really just want the records to show I made my post before Lawson made his. Other than that, I stand by my thoughts and I'll probably stick with this one till the end. I survived Tokyo Majin GK and that got pretty bleh after the inital awe value, plus I've still got hope, despite the addition of the twins.

Hayate -- I figured it out. Aside from the fact that it's a readily available show that is pretty easy to watch, this show is my Negima?! replacement. It's my supply of girl antics despite all other context, and it's not even very good at that. Negima?! really needs some more subs out, cause I enjoyed that. Hayate is just weak gags and a cast that is, for the most part, even weaker. I cannot believe they made a failure of a choker. That's a primary moe-element and I would've thought it impervious to fail, how wrong I was.

Lucky Star -- Lucky Star is awesome, Lucky Channel is not, the ED stuff is really hit or miss. And that's really all there is to it. Yui sucks, Tsukasa is swing, the rest are hits. It's 4Koma goodness and it fits the venue perfectly. Not a sleeper hit nor a wild success, but a solid victory with some extra polish anyways.

Darker than Black -- I wasn't kidding about the consistant cast thing folks, find one. Okay, so Hei's power is Electricity, that makes a hell of a lot of sense. Doesn't answer the Bulletproof Coat deal really, but the rest of it all falls into place now. Also, just 'cause it might scar someone else's mind I'm putting this concept out there. Could you imagine a relationship scene between Yin and Hei? Doesn't it just feel wrong mentally? Yeah, I got that stuck in my head for like 10 minutes, figured I'd share the pain.

Romeo x Juliet -- Tybalt is awesome, I'll be sad if he dies but I sorta figure they'll keep kinda related to the script, somewhat at least. Her and Hermoine would be a great couple, since they deserve better than the fates have ordained. I want to start a betting pool if Romeo and Juliet are both gonna survive the series run. (Actually Jiaz, that'd be a good poll one day if you run out of ideas).

Claymore -- SPOLIERS! Yeah, I put that there just in case, but I figure there's no way to dance the issue with all I want to say surrounding it. I probably won't spill it blunt, but putting 2 and 2 together isn't rocket surgery.

I don't know what to say. That wasn't what I expected in the least and I'm kinda shocked. I'm impressed that they had the nerve to do that, curious and anxious of the future because of it (hell, if the 5 strongest of the organization (a bunch of fucking racist jerks~) are downed by just one of these Menos-Grande parallels than everyone's in deep trouble). I didn't like Pris from the beginning, but the other 3 were pretty cool, variety of talents, decent synergy and relational work, fleshed out pretty well, better than any other show has done in that level of time investment. I always suspected that human-Claire was going to be a Claymore, I didn't expect it to come out of this though. It doesn't answer why she's not in the OP, but it did answer the other OP-centric question regarding imagery. Since it has a class, I can't help but wonder if we'll get a few more of these, not that I want them, that'd make this into DBZ-more, and uhh, they're all blondes already.

Part of me feels ripped, the rest confused. 10% power for the eyes and held her own, or did she? Was the entire thing a ploy to get her to a point for the strike without having to unleash the inner force, or was there actually a stalemate at that power point? I really feel that there's so much that I didn't get to see in terms of capability. It's like if Byakuya showed up for the first time back when he and Renji were collecting Rukia from the real word, but instead of just severing Ichigo's spirit link he instead just went Ban-Kai and Annhilationscaped him right out of the show then and there. We knew back then that Ichigo was capable of some pretty impressive output, given his schooling of Renji, but we hadn't seen anything but the tip of the iceberg. Same deal here, except I don't think we're going to have a Sunrise styled reset or revivial. Which might be a good thing.

EDIT: I just actually made sense of the spoiler I've seen everwhere about Claymore. Holy crap. That makes a shit-ton of sense in several respects. Also. O.o Rocking...

Mai Otome Zwei -- I'm not one to reject service. But can I have some more of the gritty and serious awesome, and less of the stupidly stupid? Service is fine, sillyness is not. For example. I loved Episode 2, with the exception of the banana peel. It didn't need to be there, and it really shouldn't have. Keep the intern or the little child away from the storyboard and deliver something that people will be proud of. The show gets enough abuse for bending the rules of anime drama with non-death deaths, don't give them an easier target.

Kiddy Grade 2 -- Hell yes. And that's all there is to it. Oldschool characters in oldschool action plus a fresh and full cast complete with rivalries and powers and a grand scenario to play it all out under.

Next time, California and the PSP game highs and lows (plus probably Odin Sphere, it looks amusing).

Edit's Edit: Fixed the spacing...go figure.

(Image) "Wish you out, out the west trail."

Current Wallpaper, though Moyism's latest post has given me new goals to strive for. I definately have some nice Kenji artwork lying around too.

I spent awhile debating between Marona and Ash's quotes (in case you don't know, the prior post is Walnut's battle phrase from Phantom Brave) but eventually decided that neither really has the ring of Psycho Burgundy.

Lots of cool stuff for the PSP sorta in the wings, so I'm thinking I might spend the tax refund + Christmas money pick one up (or maybe even a 60g PS3 depending on price drops). Definately going to put the first new paycheck towards a working computer, though the job will probably axe a fair chunk of my WoW time, so I may have to spend a portion on Command and Conquer as well (what a horror that would be, buying an awesome game).

As for the Title this week, that's what the fansubs (Umai specifically) are trying to convince me is the lyrics to Romeo x Juliet's Ending. Given that, I figure you all can guess today's topic. I think I've seen enough of the new stuff to lay down at least initial thoughts.

Before we get back into stuff I did watch, I did want to touch on something I'm following but not watching. Welcome back Ichimaru!

Got Shinsen's chunk of Venus Versus Virus (5 - 11), but haven't given it a watch, on the docket for the weekend though. Scanned a bit of it, looks relatively interesting, finally some forward moving plot. Didn't watch Ergo Proxy 18 yet though, I think I've lost hope. There's just not enough there to keep me watching, it was unique to begin with but now that's sorta gone.

Tokyo Majin GK is just all kinds of everywhere with the awesome. I'm sorta hoping that they bring in the 9th vein recovered and sane, though it'd help if I didn't think she was a Keroro Gunso character redrawn by a different Studio. The cutaway during Aoi's disrobing was particularly disturbing, since it give the implication that she wasn't stopping just to reveal the burn-scar. Here's to hoping we see some more action out of the one I thought was going to be the main character. He's cooler than the Golden Dragon anyways. I do wonder about the "Dark Law Chapter" stuff though, exactly how many episodes should I be looking forward to, given that the Chapter hasn't changed for 11 eps.

Hayate the Combat Butler -- I didn't finish Shana (Will watch it for second season though) and I didn't watch all of Zero no Tsukaima either, so that bodes sorta ill for Hayate and Nagi. That said, Nagi is incredible, and the show has a ton going for it on the humor side, plus the semi-competitive female with the lead isn't so much in the way (Unlike, say, Siesta et al). On top of that, I've got a plot that's unexpected and creative (if you overlook the Ouran similiarities. The parodies and sheer boggle randomness might be enough to keep my attentions. Good OP and an Excellent ED sorta seal the deal. Lose the stupid censoring of things that aren't even really drawn there though, keep the verbal blocks though, ***dam is funny. Also, the Narrator owns.

Heroic Age -- Okay, I'll admit I'm not a fan of the Soukyou no Fafnir animation team, the gundam-esce characters always feel a little "off" in my book. Can't explain it, just a nuance of my being I'm sure. The show had me fairly engaged, as a sort of Starcraft venue with Hercules themes, but the 12 Labors were fairly stupid. I mean, it's a stretch to get those to reach 12, and they basically boil down to make Mankind the rulers of the universe, and we'll grant you 1 wish. Seriously, there are easier ways to get a wish granted (Binding a contract C.C. style) than doing war with the Bronze and Silver Races. The Bronze are totally zerg though, right down to the Hydralisk armies. The Silver have Protoss-esce technologies from what I've seen so far, which is limited. The feral-boy as a savior and repositorie of ancient power sorta got used by Aquarion though, so I'm not really digging rewatching it again here. If they don't refine Age quickly, I think I just won't be able to stick with the show. The 4 way relationship with the Princess and her helper plus Age and the Captain's son being developed would a good way to go. Though I think that Iolas is doomed given that the Princess faints in the presence of any male other than Age. The OP was alot better than I expected, the ED is reasonable though not a standout against the rest of shows this season.

Claymore -- Another show where the art has me a little off, but still solid. The concept of half-demon, half-humans sorta has me wondering about origins, and the random male that plays doctor is sorta creepy. It's an unusual pairing but I can see it developping into something worth watching. Claire is complete and total awesomeness though, so I'll stick with it. OP and ED are nothing to write home about, but not every show can be a winner.

Romeo x Juliet -- I'm with Jiaz on this one. This show is fantastic. If you're getting hung up on the fact that it's a altered, reversed, fantasy world variant on the original story you need to get past that and see just how awesome this story of star-crossed lovers can be. The OP hints at great and tragic things while the ED just plain rocks. Alot of blood is going to be spilled in Neo-Verona and I expect to enjoy every last drop.

Darker than Black -- Ep 2 proved that they're willing to take the powers they're granting to the Contractors and make them unique and powerful. Tag on the program requirements as part of the contract granted and we've got a serious foundation for a show that could go several ways already. Add in a crap ton of mystery, the power to alter and erase memories, and a small cast of powerful characters and that's a recipe for success. As soon as they proved that Jean's power wasn't rock-based teleportation but instead matter transposition the inner-geek in me started pondering just how cool that could be, and when he used that power to rip someone's heart out of their chest, the writer's proved they could be just an devious and ingenious as I was hoping. Yin is awesome, Hwang probably is packing some serious power, the cat just speaks of the power of Yoruicihi, and now all I want to know is BK201's exact power and contract (the apartment number was a nice touch though). The OP is excellent and I'm extraordinarily intrigued by the C.C.-esce character at the end.

The question now is whether or not there is anything else I want to give a try. And Gurren Lagoon, while looking promising, I'm not sure I can handle a Head-only Mech.

(Image Overload) And out like a Lamb

Happy Year of the Boar (Yeah, sure belated I know but I had to upload the next album to Photobucket before I could say it -- this one is sorta more impuslive, which means that more borderline NSFW images ended up in the batch, as well as some pictures that are more random than background worthy (though the arguement swings both ways for pedophile Link who is mutually creepy and awesome in his image))

Not my current background however, I've got a quaint Ashley (from Wario Ware) with a Wii Mote wallpaper instead at the moment.

Hmm, seems I managed to leave the prior post untitled, which I may literally edit in as the title, as much as that wasn't the intended title in the first place it's the befittingest title now.

So, Grandparents paid a visit for the Sunday dinner (Note the lack of a Holiday term, while that may be a pretext it's genuinely unspoked in the context of a non-theistic household) and we had a few rounds of "Is that new", my Grandmother's favorite game, you'll have to press David for details, he's much more enthusiastic in his description. If I haven't stressed it enough before, anything that ever gets said in my house can get taken, twisted, and run for a touchdown pretty easily (ie: Thanksgiving away or any of the various usages of my family embracing the fact that I'm not homosexual but would support it anyways). So the following (which actually continued for another dozen or so lines of equal build) conversation broke out after I spent a good minute solid trying to find a way to extract a cupcake from it's plastic container (the standard grocery store 6-pack) without having to get my hands covered in the butter cream frosting:

"In the land of the blind, you're still handicapped."
"Ooh, handicapped, does that mean I get a parking spot?"
"Sure, there's tons of them, no one else is using them."
"So, as empty parking spaces as far as the eye can see, or not as the case may be, then?"

Secured the new job, start it in two weeks with a full day orientation opener. Going to be looking into Night School to finish the education as a result, here's hoping this is the start of something good and at least survivably enjoyable. I'm daunted, but that's true of me and anything new, I need to do something celebratory, but I've not got the foggiest clue what. I figure the combo of work + commute, let alone the prospect of night school, will probably crush my WoW time and then I'll have need to find something else to play. Hopefully the PSP or PS3 will be down in price by then.

And a bit more talk of Anime, as time permits:

Venus Versus Virus-



The jury is still out on this one, after a mere 4 episodes. I've called it a Pokemon meets Bleach thing, since the Viruses seem to have "types" like "earth" which grant them various immunities, weakness, and abilities, but otherwise have pretty much the exact description that Bleach gives to Hollows. The OP/ED speak of a much stronger relationship than I think is going to be evidenced in the show, at least prior to the very end. I'm curious as to where they'll be taking this one, I figure they're gonna go destroy the source of all Viruses to save each other. Shinsen just put out 5 more episodes though, so I'll probably have something more concrete to say in a few weeks. Until then I think I'll just lament the fact that they choose should a quasi-loli age/appearance for the primary cast and hope for some new gimmicks for the battles beyond anti-body beserking.


Negima-



This is probably the cutest of the Negima images I could find, isn't it nice? I don't think I quite agree with the extraneous random that gets into the show (Chupacabra, Mots and company), but it's a very cute and very amusing romp in the Magical Academy genre with touches of dark. Suffice to say all solid points in my book. There's still quite abit of drama and whatnot to pass through before the end, but with the lovely ladies, and the generally high quality art of the show, I think I'll keep watching till that end happens.

And just a set of images to polish off this belatedly belated post, I'll give the remained a fresh hit in a new post, perhaps alongside thoughts on the new season.

Black Lagoon-




Otome / Otome Zwei-

To go, Lagoon, Zwei, Geass, FMP:TSR, Tokyo Majin GK.

In like a Lion...

Just a little something for the recent heat (though today has gone back to a much frostier temperature far departed from the 70's of the Ides of March)


They're making a Live Action Speed Racer!? Why was I not informed of this atrocity against mankind earlier! And it's being produced by the Wachowski brothers?! How the hell do the makers of V for Vendetta and the Matrix Trilogy end up behind Live Action Speed Racer. May 9, 2008 US theater release date, I need to find some more info on this because the concept is really frightening.

The brother is off school for break this week. Which heralds the return of the PS2 and the 360. I'm back into the Guitar Hero 2, though admittedly progress is slow against the difficulty of the 7th song-set on Hard. Just like DDR I need to practice my running arpeggiation a bit and I should be fine. I think I'm getting good at Hammer-ons and Pull-Offs, though I haven't actually read about them so I can't be precisely sure. Having done the tutorial now, I think I'm just outpacing the motions, never would have noticed that they were restricted to adjacent notes on my own. That sort of thing just doesn't come up playing Bass, what with the whole 1 note at a time thing.

Played about 4 hours of Wario Woods against David last night. NES version via the Wii (wish it had been the SNES, the colors are better). Took a bit of getting used to the concept of immobile Crystals -- I'm fairly certain the SNES version let you move them all about. For those of you not familiar with the game, it's a fairly entertaining puzzle game, predating Tetris Attack (and about 10x more fun then Kirby's Avalanche, though that's a bit more colorful). Basically you have to make 3+ in a row of monsters plus at least 1 bomb to blow them up, triggering combos and whatnot.

In other news, I'm convinced that the opening riffs to 7 Minutes in Heaven (Fallout Boy's From Under the Cork Tree, Track 7) sounds exactly like the Kamisama Kazoku OP.

*Image Overload* Even though 3 isn't really an overload.

So I've been browsing around my Pandora Profile, altering a few past decisions for station refinement, bookmarking a few more songs/artists for the hell of it. The flaws of the system are pretty evident from the straight facts at the top though. My most thumbed up artists: Daft Punk and Basement Jaxx are total runaways; but the next 3, Venus Hum, Andy Bell, and The Postal Service probably have at most 4-6 songs voted high each. And in The Postal Service's case, most of that is remixes. Which goes to say that creating a station from an artist is hardly any guarantee you'll get much of that artist, all seems to be at least a bit of sinister luck.

As for the thumbed down:

BT -- Give Pandora an inch and it'll take a mile. BT has a pair of really good songs, and the rest of his works are complete garbage. But apparently they still fit the genome profile so they keep showing up. And because I've upped something by him, he'll keep recurring beyond two downed songs.

Stereo Total -- Really a hit or miss artist for me. Foriegn language singing can be a plus but their songs oscillate between bizzare and nigh-painful at times. Same problem about elimination as BT.

Erasure -- I like Andy Bell, who works with Erasure, but most of their stuff is too almost-but-not-quite Chill. It's not really relaxing so much as boring and tepid, but some of the stuff Andy Bell did with them shows through on some songs, and those are keeping them in the mix.

The last two on the list aren't noteworthy, I think they just got 2 marks down as opposed to the vast array of singularly downed artists.

I'm still experimenting with station creation and evolution. The original station: Foundations(Daft Punk), is based solely on Daft Punk, using 107 upped songs and 371 downed to explore the variety of Pandora and set the basis for Masterpiece.

Masterpiece (Andy Bell, Basement Jaxx, Daft Punk, Daniel Bedingfield, The Mountaineers, United State of Electronica, Venus Hum) is my long playing station, having 155 upped songs and 957 downed songs to shape the flow of music. I've found that some of the upped songs are really slow to come back around, either because they're so fringe or because I've trimmed the genome around them.

I've got a pair of experimental stations I fall back to when Masterpiece is having a particularly sour run. Neither one has much expose yet, perhaps 25 songs total between up and down each at most. Panic! Shiny Fallout Service (exactly who it sounds like) attempts to isolate that new genre and it's work wonderfuly so far. Actually boasting more upped than downed songs for the time being. The other station Femmes Fatale (Sarina Paris, Tsunami Bomb, Venus Hum, Ian Van Dahl, Tori Amos, Girls Aloud, Ayumi Hamasaki) is attempting to see if I can teach Pandora along a gender-singular genome, brutally pruned within my purposes (ie: the denial of Madonna, Britney Spears, Lesbians on Ecstasy, and Chicks on Speed).

While it has been long enough for another post on Webcomics (especially with my recent re-acquisitions and drops), I'm hoping to at least get Eureka out of the way, if not more anime than that with today's post - much as the warm of the store and late nights playing in Alcatraz may try and deter that - but I did want to say that Megatokyo is doing well to win back my good graces (not to imply that I have any significance amongst his countless legion of readers).

When you enjoy a series, you like it to run long. I know I'd kill (metaphorically) for more of Suzumiya Haruhi or Sousei no Aquarion (perhaps not the ideal pick since it is getting an OVA, but the idea stands). Eureka kinda wonks that facet, simply because you don't need everything they decided to enclose to love the show. I don't know what Eureka's target really was, like who they were aiming for. Sure it's got Mechas and Explosions, but the LFOs are pretty basic and the explosions are pink and colorful. It's got Skyboarding, but they don't use it for any real tricks. There's not a ton of cute animals (Gulliver, Skyfish), but they are present. The tiniest bit of sex, some slice of life, epic struggle... it's kinda all over the place.









Alot of the show could've been about the dichotomy. Eureka/Anemone, Corelian messenger against her artifically created doppleganger. Renton/Dominic, which is actually more of the same person just caught on different sides. Holland and Dewey, Holland and Charles, Talho and Ray, Talho and Renton's sister. The show has a wider cast than that though, so it never fully falls down to those levels, even if it doesn't really need to give everyone a story. They live their lives: Matthieu and Hilda are married, Doggy gets his piloting spotlight even if he gets abused for half the show (I still laugh when Holland kicks the stool into his leg), Giget gets to educate Eureka about being a girl. All the minor characters have roles and parts and combine to make up something greater, Gekko State as a concept and a family, however dysfunctional.

For me the show really won when it was cheesy, musical, and raw. I couldn't stand the episodes where Renton meets people while wandering and learns to appreciate something better, or a life lesson. Nor did I deal well with Eureka learning about makeup, or the whole misunderstanding episode where everyone thought Renton was trying to make Eureka have sex with him (though, it was amusing how they all reacted to it, especially the guys smuggling him magazines). The children probably deserve their own rant, they barely redeem them from total loathing (omniloathe!) at the end, but the whole Eden stretch when they find true-Earth is pretty god-awful. What won was Ray and Charles, all the fights -- especially the one where Renton finally realizes he's killing people -- and, of course, the one couple I really did like.


While I wouldn't reccomend it, just watching the last 3 episodes of Eureka 7 would probably suffice to capture the core of the story. You'd miss out on alot of the story (which I'd certainly hope would be true given that there were 47 other episodes), alot of it good arcs: Ray and Charles, searching for a replacement for Anemone, Project Orange, etc.

I probably could choose something a bit before that, perhaps any point where Dominic is learning the truth about Anemone, or Anemone realizing the truth of Dewey's nature, but 48 is the solidifying episode of it all. Anemone's monologue in Ballet Mechanique is powerful, and the reaction from theEnd (Shame Nirvash wasn't some reversal of that name, for mirror purposes) really enchances the effect.

49 really demonstrates how planned Dewey was, and whether Great Hero Thurston's information was that good or not is unknown, but the fact that the necklaces are in place not only at the first episode, but also in the flashbacks predating that, is significant if odd (did they never think to take that off when she left the army?). The Compac Drive was probably part of Adrock writings, though I'm uncertain how he obtained it, given what Norbu had to go through to get his.

Episode 50 is just cheese. Though with casual Amenone they could've had Dewey's kids in a firefight with Maurice and I wouldn't have really minded.

Overall it's a really great series, if you can just make it past the kids and the attempts at what is essentially slice-of-life for the socially inept (at least N.H.K. had the concept as focal based on the intent of the episode). The music rocks, the characters are cool, and everybody loves rainbow explosions.


Closing note: I saw the box for the PS2 game the other day, it was scary. At least I guess I recoignized Holland, the rest seem just game-original generics. Dunno how many of the rest of the cast show up in the course of the game.

*Image Overload* Viewing Habits 1 (Part 5 -- The Anime-lite half of the post)

Note, I used the *Image Overload* Tag with strict emphasis in mind.

Finished Guitar Hero on Medium, 5 Starred everything, gotta get back to working on Hard. Then 5 Starring those, and then we'll be into the real difficulty of the game. About that time I figure I'll get sick of even the songs that I like and be forced to get Guitar Hero 1 to keep things interesting. Course, by my current pacing that'll be like mid-June before I've gotten that far.

Anyone wanting to point out that the above pictures (Rider, kinda a grainy scan, and the original, chokers ftw) are actually girls playing Bass can take a seat and a number, not that I'm going to heed any of it -- I prefer Bass anyways.

Back when Christmas rolled around I pondered awhile on asking for a few DVDs of a Cartoon/TV/Anime nature and thusly spent awhile deciding what would actually be worth having in a repeatable format. Obviously it had to be something that I thoroughly enjoyed, probably comedic in nature. David's copy of The Critic is a prime example of a solid decision, that show was so amusing and quotable ("Buy my Book" and "Penguins can't fly!" as primely recoignizable examples). My revised shortlist ended up reaching the following conclusion.

* Pick 1: Teen Titans. Probably the weakest pick on the list, but the show appeals to me despite everything that it's frequently knocked for. The half-adopted anime-mannerisms and style aren't detractions. The show covers some really amusing and rather endearing concepts and does so without resorting to inelegant bloodbaths. Not every episode is a winner but Robin vs Slade fights and anything involving Raven's past are pretty much guaranteed wins.

*Pick 2: Naruto

Okay, so maybe that was totally an excuse to use that image, only not really. Naruto really appeals to me on both the viewer and the group level. Now everyone gives me the strange look about the latter, so let me explain. There's anime that's great to watch, and then there's anime that's great to watch with someone else. I mean, I'm enjoying Welcome to the N.H.K. but it's not the sort of anime you'd bring out to watch as a group, it's not that style. Don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about the perverse level to the show (I'm not that far actually) but the complexity, it's the sort of thing you want to flip back through, and have sole control over.



I mean, sure, Naruto just fill the generic shounen slot on the watch list, but it's the creme of shounen shows that I have access to. What else is there with that level of battles and relationship interplay? DragonBall-Anything is purely around for mockeries sake, at least as far as I'm concerned, and while Bleach is out, there isn't enough of it yet to really be a contender. I mean, they're not in Soul Society, which, truth be told is all I care about. You have to get Ishida out of the picture in Bleach for me, I just don't like his early introduction or anything in the middle range. It's not until they drop the doilies and the dead mentor/grandfather that I can even begin to appreciate the fact that he's a dead-eye fighter. Same with Chad, but at least they cut the crap quickly with him. Before I totally sidetrack myself, I'd just like to say that Renji's English VA does not fit at all though the attitude is right... ... ... and for the same reason, I'm waiting eagerly for Ichimaru Gin's first arrival.



Back on track, Naruto is aimed right at the mid-adolescent range (some sexual appeal, some violence without going heavy on either and no language) but it doesn't do anything to alienate those outside the range, the US-side editing is light enough not to be troublesome, and its got eye candy for both genders. Sure there's a few nuances, like why the hell they chose Frogs, but they make that work. It's great writing, lots of intrigue, and ninjas, everyone loves ninjas.



Really, I think One Piece could've done this if it hadn't been toned down to kiddy level and butchered so.


See what I mean? Total bad-ass-ness. (Yeah, I realize that's just fan art, but it's cool anyways, and One Piece definately had the potential to be). 4Kids should've had faith in the power of the original to gather a fanbase, instead of trying to force it through edits.

* Pick 3: Invader Zim
No brainer really. Zim is awesomeness, mostly in the for of Dib and Gir, but awesomeness nonetheless. J.Vasquez is a brilliant, if twisted, mind and Zim manages to do everything amusing without falling into the overly-disgusting-images/concepts pitfall that brought down Ren & Stimpy, Rocko's Modern Life, and other similar shows.

The Doom Song, Taquitos, the Jolly Boots of Doom, and Gir's cupcake being prime examples of Invader Zim's level of humor, it's definately something I could see myself buying on DVD.



*Pick 4: Avatar
"Wait, you can use your bending?!"
"Sure, they didn't cover my face"
"Why didn't you do that earlier"
"Gin."
"Gin?"
"You know about Gin right?"
"Sure. There's two kinds of Gin: Positive Gin from attacking and Negative Gin when you're defending."
"And Neutral Gin."
"Neutral Gin?"
"When you do nothing and wait for the right moment."
"So there's 3 kinds of Gin?"
"Actually there's 85, but lets just focus on the third."

The frequency with which Avatar: The Last Airbender can get me to laugh is pretty astounding. The show has all the magic that Naruto possess without actually coming from overseas. The groundwork rules that the powers in the show exist within were laid back at the beginning and the creativity they use within those parameters is remarkable and amusing. Avatar is bloodless but still not friendly, themes of Hatred and Revenge are fairly common. The show has likeable and visually appealing characters and the battles are bright and creative. Plus, the dialog not only rocks, but started in English and thus didn't lose any of it's jokes to translation (some things just can't cross the language barrier).

Honorable mention to Firefly.

Out of the Night and into the Twilight (Part 4 -- N3 and Zelda)

Decided I'd gone a few too many text heavy posts without touching hitting an image. Bandied a few ideas back and forth but decided that going with something in the Ninety-Nine Nights vein would be most fitting, since I'm stowing the Anime-Commentary for another post.

[Picking up where I left off]

Aspharr in the demo was really what hooked me into the game, specifically his impale maneuvers. When Aspharr (or Ass-y, as Ian calls him) runs an enemy through with his spear, he's got a bevy of options at his disposal.

• Regular Attack -- Smashes the enemy from side to side (Think of any old cartoon, like Popeye flipping Bruno back and forth) battering other enemies.
• Heavy Attack -- Spiral with the impaled enemy like doing a shot put and hurl it into a group of enemies, knocking them away.
• Jump -- Leap aerial and front flip, crashing down Pike-first with the impaled enemy and landing with a shockwave.
• Charge -- Run forward extending the hapless enemy as a battering ram then hurl him into his friends.
• Other -- You can actually combine several of these Charge + Charge for better distance, Charge + Leap, Charge + Heavy and get even more amusing attacks.

Ashparr's Orb Spark calls down a Holy Nuke. There really isn't a better explanation actually. About 3 spear lengths in front of him there is a giant orb of blue Holy Energy that draws enemies around it in, and then explodes. Generally it sends enemies flying back to where they had been standing, but in more confined spaces, it occasionally just lines the boundaries of the area with a line of corpses.

Myifee (Me Fee)
When you first select Myifee the game tells you he's a mercenary however that's actually untrue, as the opening cutscene for him details when he joined and why. Myifee is perhaps the greatest story ever told, mostly because as best as I can tell, he joined up with the mercenaries because a pretty girl did before him. He ends up saving pretty much every major human installation during the course of his missions and in the very end, gets the girl Epharr (F R -- seriously) who was a former Orc slave and for that reason turned into a warrior. She's also one of those random RPG-esce types who has a mask, on her head even, but never wears it. When you down the Orc Chief Lieu she dashes in to deliver the killing blow, and then stands there panting exhaustedly. If you play Aspharr's campaign first (you unluck Myifee and him at the same time) you still get to see this part of the scene, which leave Asparr going "What was that all about" in a 'O....kkkkkkkkkkkayyyyyyy' kind of way. In Myifee's campaign she collapses crying and he the comfort hugs her.

Though slow as hell, Myifee has a suprising amount of armor for someone who's actual attire consists of pants and a massive dual-bladed sword on a string. I'd love to say psyche, but it's all true -- he really does have a Twin Blade that he whirls about like a yo-yo at times. He only gets one impale, and that consists of throwing his Blade through and enemy, recalling the weapon so it sits on his shoulder with the impaled enemy above it, and then lashing the weapon out again hurling the corpse. Myifee has fire as his element, so his most powerful attacks utilize him calling fire up from the earth rather than actually swinging his blade. His orb spark calls down a storm of meteorites to smash into the field ahead of him, and he can turn his focus, redirecting the subsiquent waves. The ability is battlefield carnage at it's best with random division of enemy troops being hurled skyward by the massive explosions.

Dwingvatt
Dwingvatt's a goblin who watched his brother die at Inphyy's hands protecting goblin civilians that she was attacking. Really, he should've just attacked Inphyy, but that wouldn't have created this anguished goblin figure. I'm not certain if you're supposed to identify with him, I certainly didn't. He's lightning fast, starts with the double dash ability and has several ninja-esce abilites, including smoke bomb teleports. Wields twin daggers but isn't very damaging. His Spark calls down a tornado, but it's not all that impressive as far as Orb Sparks go.

Klarrann
A Priest of the Church, Klarrann is the only character who can't jump, and that goes a long way towards tying him with Myifee for slowest character (Myifee can chain dash whereas the other characters suffer a delay after dashing, so while Myifee walks slower he can keep pace over distance). He wields a giant symbol of the church, which is apparently a long pole really that he bashes stuff with. Klarrann's campaign reveals that the King of Nights has gotten the Goblin King to try and fuse the Orb of Darkness with the Orb of Light, which would bring the land under 99 Nights of Darkness, at the end of which the King of Nights would reign supreme and the Ages of Man and Goblin would end.

Klarrann has as much variety with his impales as Aspharr did, only his impales are actually grapples. Klarrann can pick up a measly goblin with his free hand and: smash him around, charge him with holy energy, toss him into his buddies, pound his face into the ground, leap into the air and hurl him downward, or about a half-dozen other combinations of these. His Orb Attack state turns his Holy Symbol into a gigantic energy-sword that he swings around destroying enemies. Klarrann's Orb Spark calls down a torrent of bolts of holy energy in an area. I actually landed the attack directly on Pyurrot (Dark Elf Leader) in Klarrann's final mission and the damage not only obliterated her army, but left her at 1 hp (just goes to prove you can't kill a Boss with a Orb Spark).

Tyurru
Tyurru is the second least varied of the characters, beaten only by the secret character. Accompanied by a spirit of water (complete with a -tan name) Tyurru learns the horrors of war as she fights. In the end she loses her master to her friend who's been corrupted by the lure of the Orb of Darkness's power and has to defeat her. She's a Water Magus and thus her primary attack launches a small bolt of water (about 3/4ths of screen length as default distance, though she'll auto aim the proper distance for up to twice that far if there's an enemy in the line) and her heavy attack unleashes a giant wave to wash over enemies. Tyurru's fairly weak in her damage en-masse with terribly low hp and armor, but she decimates heavier foes and can out-maneuver anything by floating on her magical staff (shaped like a key). For all of her missions you get Yesperratt, Earth Magus - that'd be her friend, to fight alongside you. Yesperratt also tends to be wide-spread though not massive damage. Tyurru can also conjure large floating balls of water and knock them around into enemies, but that's mostly a waste of time better spent just nuking them. Her Orb Attack just empowers her regular strikes. It makes the Bolts of Water piercing and fatal, which means she absolutely demolishes any army facing her with it, and causes her heavy attack to fire seeking globes of water that explode and hurl enemies everywhere (great for combo count, not so great for kills). Tyurru's Orb Spark calls out a Tsunami which destroys armies and washes them away, it's pretty good for massive Xbox 360 slowdown.

Vigk Vagk
VV's a "friendly Troll" who gets captured by orcs and turned into a weapon of war. He barely takes damage from anything, but has no variety in his strikes. The only saving grace is his ability to use the enviroment. As VV levels he gains new grasping abilities, expanding from nothing to including grabbing soliders (and later dual wielding them), logs, rocks, and entire trees. VV gets befriended by a goblin, who dies when they are sent to unsafe territory to fight, so as Vigk Vagk you end up fighting not only most of the Light side heroes, but also the Goblin army heroes as well. His Orb Spark is a gigantic yell that ends up working similarly to Tyurru's except VV's has an initial delay, blasts out to further away, and can absolutely stall the Xbox for 5-10 seconds as it processes all the damage and corpse movement.

Extras
I've actually been working on getting all 1000 points worth of achievements out of N3, just to say I did it, and thankfully getting my B Rank missions improved coincides nicely with leveling the heroes to 9 (I think I got Myifee that far, but only him). The game boasts a very impressive gallery of unlockable images, sadly I don't know of a way to get images there onto the computer, as some of them would make for spectacular wallpapers.

-------------------------------------------------
Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Well, the title actually becomes meaningful in the last moments of the game, but this is one I don't intend to spoil. Beat the game with about 30 hours poured into it, which is less than I had anticipated, but on par for a Zelda game. I've got 9 out of 24 Bugs left to go, about 24 of the 60 Poes still to be hunted, and I believe 15 Heart Pieces (Definately have to find the 20 Cats, only one I'm sure I'm missing). Other than that, I'm done, unless there's some achievements to be done regarding fishing (besides the rolling game, which I haven't done, but will, out of completionary neurosis). Finishing all that might land me at 40 hours, but that's sorta stretching the concept.

I took out the Cavern of Trials on my second pass through it's depths. Ended up using 2 Faeries and a Great Fairy Tears (for the damage, not really the healing) which has the same effect as Grandma's Soup in Wind Waker only it's so much harder to acquire. Speaking of Wind Waker, the rule was in full effect most of the time I was playing. For those who don't know/remember, the rule goes basically like this "Oh my God, Colin, how can you suck so badly at this and still succeed?!?!". Essentially, I breeze through the complex portions of dungeons through a creative blend of fighting prowess and insight, but if it's something like standing still on a platform for 10 seconds or walking a straight line, you can expect me to fail disastrously at least twice.

I found it sorta dishearting to have the first Dungeon Item, the Boomerang, have a story and a personality and all the rest to just be what you expected, but not enough to sour my opinion of the game at all. But combining the Boomerang with the conventional "puts-out-fires" weapon was a good mixture, even if I completely neglected the Boomerang and the Slingshot

The Ball and Chain was different, but really I prefer the ease of use and similar power inherent in the Hammer. Plus, the beauty of Hammer + Spin Attack, or the infamously genius Hammer-Stunning a Room full of Chu-Chu Jellies simply outpaces the Ball and Chain. Plus, it was rarely used, mostly a gimmick item for the dungeon with little application outside of those specific enemies/dungeon.

The spinner, on the other hand, had all the impact of the suck jar from Seasons. It was a serious WTF, followed by a 'this is genius!' It had novelity and purpose (even if it's applications were limited outside of it's home dungeon) and was one of the cooler things that the game implemented. It's a rudimentarily successful combat weapon, aids you at moving over difficult terrain, and makes for some of the greatest jumping puzzles that have been designed. I mean, they could make a $15 spin-off minigame completely designed around the Spinner and I'd buy it (That idea is total gold, I know).

I need to find a way to integrate spoiler tags via HTML, so that'll be tomorrows project amid other stuff, then I'll post my feelings about the rest of Twilight Princess. Still to go, Resolutions and Anime.

The Pre-Christmas Post

Which actually got posted on the rollover of Christmas Eve Morning, but close enough for my purposes.

Uncle reccomends soldering to fix the Hard Drive issue, which seems highly plausable, that'll probably be a goal for next weekend. Not much else to rave about at the moment, as getting some rest is much higher on my todo list.

Yes, I do plan to at least touch on the images recently used, as well as my selection in general.

Subnotes: 1) Damn Inuyasha for movies that Adult Swim marathoned instead of Eureka Seven's Astral Apache (that's the assault on the Capital for Norbu, aka the ultra-cheese moment), as well as Renji/Kuchiki (not gonna try his first name) beating the crap out of Ichigo. And whatever Trinity Blood has up it's sleeve next.

2) Yeah, this isn't part of the original upload, but it's Christmas, and otherwise I wasn't going to have a picture at all, though the Haruhi trio with presents will probably be tomorrow's (today's) image -- that's a most excellent blush.

Elementary, my dear Watson...

So, I've traced the problem with the 160 Hard Drive. It's 4 pin power only has 3 pins. Now to stir the waters of my font and divine what resolution I can. I need my access to Haruhi~

Work sucks, no shock there, more updates later.

I totally changed this title

Playing with a few layout options related to pictures still, and although this one has so very little to do with Christmas I figured I'd exhaust the supply of Holiday themed pictures I'd included in the first upload (Which does imply that there is another collection of pictures beyond the original 317 forming, and that it has some more holiday pictures).

Ooooh, the new Google-Blogger hybrid Bloggers system is pretty nifty, and when I throw in an image it keeps it there while I'm posting instead of a hunk of WYSIWYG HTML Meta-garbage.

I won't be playing with my labels section quite yet, and I don't think this image ties to what I want to say about anime. I'm no authority on the system, I certainly don't and won't manage a blog devoted just to the topic, but still I do have an attachement to both Webcomics and Anime.

Either way, plenty to get done.

♫ Making Christmas, Making Christmas ... ♫

Leaving it as shortlist, actual list ended up trimming the Wii / 360 items and just tacking on some music from that post a few months back.

***
NWN 2


**
Wii / Twilight Princess
360 //
/ Gears of War.
/ * Enchanted Arms
/ Burnout (The 360 version, grrr)
/ * Ninety Nine Nights
Valkerie Profile 2

*
Guitar Hero 1/2

Emphasis on Quasi

It kinds occurs to me that I could've just directly uploaded these thing from my computer, but given that this was meant as a worktime diversion (which I no longer need, in recoignition of the pressures of the Holiday Rush) this method suits my purposes.

Asuna is <3. Negima?! is absoutely wonderful, as are the seasonal OVAs that I don't actually have my hands on yet (despite what the hicks assaulting Jiaz's blog via comments might say). I have at least another one of her, with her sword, in the picture trove that I'll get to someday. Negima art isn't too frequent, but at least I don't have to sort through tons of tag-content filtered pages like I do with Bleach (What's that, a Harem series without tons of H-art attached, unthinkable).

Asuna's long hair is totally victory though. Not really a Casual Tag, and the lack of a substancial top removes the chance at a Midriff Tag (another of my favorites, alongside Choker). The perennial hunger, plus the Cosplay card, aren't really my favorites, but the bells are fun, as is the sleeping. Pretty, but not wallpaper worthy.

Quasi-Daily Picture #1

The odds of this being a daily trend are probably pretty small, but since I got Flock to upload all the pictures (~330) that I'd gathered off Danbooru, and because I'm stuck late at work, I figured I'd start this idea of mine up and running. And perhaps this way I can slim down the collection or add to those of my reader (I might've made that plural, but optimism isn't my venue).

Given the nature of my choices, this'll probably never be SFW, but most of choices don't get more risque than implied or veiled nudity.

Yorichi to start it off with (there's no sorting, just the original filenames as they were collected, reversed due to the upload process). I'm a huge fan of the "casual" tag on Danbooru (Bonus points because the images have to involve clothes for the tag in the first place, so my tag-blogging doesn't come into play) and Yorichi was a great mystery for awhile. Plus, flaunting her sexuality on Ichigo was amusing to no end; her being a badass ex-ninja elite doesn't count against her either. Extra score for the pun on the shirt. And on top of that, it's an inoffensive artist watermark. Jeans and Midriff are big on my list, and the sulty look and gloves are pretty nice as well. Sorta an odd head position, but oh well. I need some more of these, they're just nice. Same reason I love the art accompanying Bleach OPs 4 and 5.

So, this is worth what, 2000 Words? I'll try to match that later.