Monday, May 30, 2005
fanime 2005
Fanime 2005 is over and just wanted to put down some stuff before I forget. As I mentioned in the comments section of a previous entry, overall Fanime 2005 was pretty damn bad this year. I won't go into anymore details about that though.
Friday - I was there on Friday, but I don't remember anything I did that day, other than the fact that I spent maybe 2-3 hours playing UT2004 in the console gaming room. One thing I noticed in the gaming room was the Naruto gamecube game. It was 4 players, and had all the major characters of the anime in it. The gameplay is more traditional than SSB, but the Naruto game also had a 3d layout, which was mainly used to spread the fighting out a bit. Each fighter would focus on fighting only one guy at a time. Even though that sounds like it wouldn't work, it seemed to work pretty well. The fights are pretty neat, with the ninja log trick a part of the gameplay and the characters special attacks were pretty nifty. At the dealers room, I picked up some ComicsOne/DR Master manga that I was looking for.
Saturday - This day was industry panel day, sortof. Since Fanime has lost significant influence as a major con, nothing important was announced or anything. It is a good chance for people attending the con to ask questions to company representatives that otherwise would go unanswered. The Broccoli panel has a bit of news I found interesting: apparently they will eventually be releasing the Aquarian Age trading card game in North America. I don't think it will succeed, but I'll definitely pick up a couple of packs just too look at the artwork. At the dealers room, I picked up an Usada Hikaru (aka Rabi en Rose) print, which was the basis of the wallpaper that I'm currenting using on my desktop. There was also Musicfest, which I already commented on in a previous post.
Sunday - I went to the CLAMP panel and found out some news that greatly relieved me. The manga Wish, which is awesome, but had a crappy ending, had that crappy ending for a reason. As it turned out, the ending that almost everyone wanted, which was basically just using the second to last chapter, was the ending that CLAMP wanted. The publisher didn't like that ending and forced CLAMP to write an additional chapter, which sucked and made the ending a lot weaker. Also, the reason X and Legal Drug is on hiatus is because of conflicts with the publisher, in that the publisher doesn't like the ending that CLAMP wants, so CLAMP isn't working on the titles that are printed by that particular publisher. Hopefully, CLAMP will win in the end and the publisher will give in and let them end their works the way they want to. Went to the AMV finals, which was ok. The humor category was a bit weak, I had already seen the best video in that category over 6 months ago. Overall the videos were technically excellent as usual, and no bullshit game videos like that crap that was at AX last year, which was total BS.
Monday - Picked up a ROD tv Michelle gashopon figure at the dealers room.
Overall there weren't too many good cosplayers, but I distinctly remember seeing a girl in a kimono or a yukata (not sure which) and thinking, "So that why in Japan they consider girls wearing kimonos attractive."
One thing that I find crazy every year in the dealers room is the fact that people will spend to the absolute last dime on their anime goods. You hear people talk about how they want to pick up some stuff, but if they do, they won't have any money for food later yet still end up buying the stuff anyway. Or people who pay half with cash and half with debit, because they don't have enough money in their bank account to pay fully with the bank card. Or people who decide to spend their gas money on anime goods because they "think they can make it home without running out of gas." Thats just nuts.
Anyone interested in going to AX for July 4th weekend?
Friday - I was there on Friday, but I don't remember anything I did that day, other than the fact that I spent maybe 2-3 hours playing UT2004 in the console gaming room. One thing I noticed in the gaming room was the Naruto gamecube game. It was 4 players, and had all the major characters of the anime in it. The gameplay is more traditional than SSB, but the Naruto game also had a 3d layout, which was mainly used to spread the fighting out a bit. Each fighter would focus on fighting only one guy at a time. Even though that sounds like it wouldn't work, it seemed to work pretty well. The fights are pretty neat, with the ninja log trick a part of the gameplay and the characters special attacks were pretty nifty. At the dealers room, I picked up some ComicsOne/DR Master manga that I was looking for.
Saturday - This day was industry panel day, sortof. Since Fanime has lost significant influence as a major con, nothing important was announced or anything. It is a good chance for people attending the con to ask questions to company representatives that otherwise would go unanswered. The Broccoli panel has a bit of news I found interesting: apparently they will eventually be releasing the Aquarian Age trading card game in North America. I don't think it will succeed, but I'll definitely pick up a couple of packs just too look at the artwork. At the dealers room, I picked up an Usada Hikaru (aka Rabi en Rose) print, which was the basis of the wallpaper that I'm currenting using on my desktop. There was also Musicfest, which I already commented on in a previous post.
Sunday - I went to the CLAMP panel and found out some news that greatly relieved me. The manga Wish, which is awesome, but had a crappy ending, had that crappy ending for a reason. As it turned out, the ending that almost everyone wanted, which was basically just using the second to last chapter, was the ending that CLAMP wanted. The publisher didn't like that ending and forced CLAMP to write an additional chapter, which sucked and made the ending a lot weaker. Also, the reason X and Legal Drug is on hiatus is because of conflicts with the publisher, in that the publisher doesn't like the ending that CLAMP wants, so CLAMP isn't working on the titles that are printed by that particular publisher. Hopefully, CLAMP will win in the end and the publisher will give in and let them end their works the way they want to. Went to the AMV finals, which was ok. The humor category was a bit weak, I had already seen the best video in that category over 6 months ago. Overall the videos were technically excellent as usual, and no bullshit game videos like that crap that was at AX last year, which was total BS.
Monday - Picked up a ROD tv Michelle gashopon figure at the dealers room.
Overall there weren't too many good cosplayers, but I distinctly remember seeing a girl in a kimono or a yukata (not sure which) and thinking, "So that why in Japan they consider girls wearing kimonos attractive."
One thing that I find crazy every year in the dealers room is the fact that people will spend to the absolute last dime on their anime goods. You hear people talk about how they want to pick up some stuff, but if they do, they won't have any money for food later yet still end up buying the stuff anyway. Or people who pay half with cash and half with debit, because they don't have enough money in their bank account to pay fully with the bank card. Or people who decide to spend their gas money on anime goods because they "think they can make it home without running out of gas." Thats just nuts.
Anyone interested in going to AX for July 4th weekend?
Saturday, May 28, 2005
Fanime2005 Musicfest
Just got back from Musicfest and just wanted to make some comments before I forget.
Maria Yamamoto will never get out of idol status and go mainstream. Her live rendition of the Petite Princess Yucie opening was pretty bad. On the other had, the Yucie image song was ok. For the record I like the Yucie opening song. In any case, she wouldn't have even been in the top 30 of a season of American Idol. She's still very cute and a pretty darn good voice actress, so she still has a lot of talent... just not in music.
Ramen and Rice were awesome! If you don't know who they are, they are basically sisters who live in the Bay Area and play the violin and cello. They're pretty famous at Fanime for doing classical street performances of anime/game music on their instruments at the con and drawing huge crowds around them when performing. This year they finally got to perform in a concert setting and did their thing with classical versions of a Naruto opening, a Bleach opening, a Full Metal Alchemist opening, some Zelda, Mario, and Final Fantasy themes, an Eva theme (I think), and a video game mega mix. Lots of fun, people were singing along to the more popular lyrics such as the FMA and Naruto ones.
Kumiko Kato has way way more talent than Maria Yamamoto. Her singing is pretty good, although it basically sounds like a Japanese version of the kind of pop you can hear here. She's releasing an album in the U.S. soon, but I don't think she's going to be a megablockbuster hit over here, considering her English songs weren't as good as her Japanese ones.
ZZ was AMAZING. They reminded me of back in the day when Rock and Alternative were king and still good. These guys were hardcore J-rock, it was awesome. I was going to buy a cd but the line was too long after the concert.
Maria Yamamoto will never get out of idol status and go mainstream. Her live rendition of the Petite Princess Yucie opening was pretty bad. On the other had, the Yucie image song was ok. For the record I like the Yucie opening song. In any case, she wouldn't have even been in the top 30 of a season of American Idol. She's still very cute and a pretty darn good voice actress, so she still has a lot of talent... just not in music.
Ramen and Rice were awesome! If you don't know who they are, they are basically sisters who live in the Bay Area and play the violin and cello. They're pretty famous at Fanime for doing classical street performances of anime/game music on their instruments at the con and drawing huge crowds around them when performing. This year they finally got to perform in a concert setting and did their thing with classical versions of a Naruto opening, a Bleach opening, a Full Metal Alchemist opening, some Zelda, Mario, and Final Fantasy themes, an Eva theme (I think), and a video game mega mix. Lots of fun, people were singing along to the more popular lyrics such as the FMA and Naruto ones.
Kumiko Kato has way way more talent than Maria Yamamoto. Her singing is pretty good, although it basically sounds like a Japanese version of the kind of pop you can hear here. She's releasing an album in the U.S. soon, but I don't think she's going to be a megablockbuster hit over here, considering her English songs weren't as good as her Japanese ones.
ZZ was AMAZING. They reminded me of back in the day when Rock and Alternative were king and still good. These guys were hardcore J-rock, it was awesome. I was going to buy a cd but the line was too long after the concert.
Tuesday, May 24, 2005
fanime
Will be going to Fanime this weekend. Anyone else going? LOL, but seriously, if anyone wants something, let me know.
Sunday, May 22, 2005
a bit of biking
I biked quite a distance for me today. My guess is that it was around 40 miles. Left the house around 11:45 and got home at about 6:15. I first went to golfland to check out what was in their arcades these days. Unfortunately, I had my backpack with me, so I was asked to put it in a locker. I left instead and never got a chance to check out the arcade. Then I went to Milpitas square and got a sandwich at Erik's Deli Cafe. I love Erik's, but the sandwich was pretty poorly made this time. Hit up the Great Mall, and checked out Dave and Buster's arcade. I have some points left on a D&B card, but like last time, that arcade is total crap for people like me. I walked around the whole mall, and noticed the EB changed to Gamestop, and the internet cafe was totally full. Thought about getting the newest Yoko Ishida album released in the U.S. at Media Play but decided to wait a bit, even though there was only one copy left. It has some neat songs on it, like the AMG tv op, and the Konomini ed. Also, the Century Theater 20 had half of their screens showing Star Wars. Biked to work afterwords, to refill my water bottle and take a break. Then headed towards McCarthy Ranch, passing through what Jing calls "Cisco City". The wind was especially strong and really took a toll. At McCarthy Ranch, they were having some sort of event, but since it was almost 5pm by that time, the event was closing up. My legs were pretty dead tired by this time, worse than the jelly legs, more like "going to hurt for the next two weeks" kind of tired, but I headed home. Took a break at a park off of Warms Springs Blvd. There was quite a large party/barbeque going on at one of the picnic tables. It seemed to be people who would be college aged, from what I could tell. Maybe they were celebrating graduation? They were pretty boisterous and a lot of them were drunk. One thing I noticed that I thought was pretty weird, there was this guy and girl who were obviously together and whenever they kissed, the guy would grab her ass and pull up the bottom of her shorts a bit or something. After they would finsh kissing, the girl would pull down her shorts again. The rest of the ride was uneventful, although I think it was sheer will that got me up that damn hill on Paseo.
Thursday, May 19, 2005
rss feed added
Since firefox has an rss extension and I found out how awesome it can be, I added an rss feed (atom 0.3 apparently) to the site.
firefox
You know you're an anime fan when you install a new browser just to have firefox-ko in the about mozilla firefox menu.
Anyway, I've been playing around with some of the extentions, and some of them rock, like the media player connectivity extension. No more damn integrated media players in the browser!!! WOOT! Anyway, time to sleep now.
Anyway, I've been playing around with some of the extentions, and some of them rock, like the media player connectivity extension. No more damn integrated media players in the browser!!! WOOT! Anyway, time to sleep now.
Monday, May 16, 2005
gamefaqs spring 2005 villian battle
Filled out my bracket for the gamefaqs 2005 spring villian battle. Doing pretty damn good right now, but I think I made a couple of mistakes in my bracket.
I followed a couple of rules when filling out the bracket, in order of most to least important.
1. Sephiroth always wins.
2. Final fantasy(6j, 7, 8, and 10) characters always win.
3. Zelda, Metroid, and Mario characters always win.
4. Characters from the golden age (SNES, Genesis) always win.
5. Pick the characters from the game I enjoy.
6. If I have never played the game before, I will pick what I believe is the more popular game.
7. Pick the RPG.
The red circled parts are the ones where I believe I made the incorrect choice.
1. Dr. Robotnik vs Sin.
Sin is a ff10 character (item 2), and Dr. Robotnik is from the golden age (item 4), but I'm getting the feeling that Dr. Robotnik is a more popular character.
2. M Bison vs Diablo.
M Bison is from the Street Figher series, which is golden age (item 4) while Diablo is a game I enjoy (item 5). In this case, I love Diablo, and I think he is a better villan, but street fighter is probably more popular still.
3. Kefka vs Ganondorf.
Kefka is from ff6j (item 2) while Ganondorf is from Zelda (item 3). The only problem is this year's E3, I'm guessing the BIGGEST thing is going to be the teenaged Link in the new Gamecube Zelda game, which should push Ganondorf over Kefka.
But we'll see how it ends up.
I followed a couple of rules when filling out the bracket, in order of most to least important.
1. Sephiroth always wins.
2. Final fantasy(6j, 7, 8, and 10) characters always win.
3. Zelda, Metroid, and Mario characters always win.
4. Characters from the golden age (SNES, Genesis) always win.
5. Pick the characters from the game I enjoy.
6. If I have never played the game before, I will pick what I believe is the more popular game.
7. Pick the RPG.
The red circled parts are the ones where I believe I made the incorrect choice.
1. Dr. Robotnik vs Sin.
Sin is a ff10 character (item 2), and Dr. Robotnik is from the golden age (item 4), but I'm getting the feeling that Dr. Robotnik is a more popular character.
2. M Bison vs Diablo.
M Bison is from the Street Figher series, which is golden age (item 4) while Diablo is a game I enjoy (item 5). In this case, I love Diablo, and I think he is a better villan, but street fighter is probably more popular still.
3. Kefka vs Ganondorf.
Kefka is from ff6j (item 2) while Ganondorf is from Zelda (item 3). The only problem is this year's E3, I'm guessing the BIGGEST thing is going to be the teenaged Link in the new Gamecube Zelda game, which should push Ganondorf over Kefka.
But we'll see how it ends up.
PSP
So I finally checked out the PSP while I was at Benson's house (to play Risk: Godwar) and didn't see what the hype was about. It seems to be a pretty looking system with really lame games and super crazy happy ultra long load times. This is the system that will revolutionize handheld gaming? This will bring console games into the portable realm? Whatever. Oh, and load times in home systems are damn annoying, but LOAD TIMES IN A PORTABLE ARE TOTAL BULLSHIT.
Friday, May 13, 2005
silicon based technology, misc stuff
So there is still some silicon based technology that needs to be developed more.
Photovoltaic cells - If these get mass produced at the same economy of scale as regular integrated circuits, the cost per kilowatt hour could be fantasitic. Of course, you don't have the scaling factor that you get with regular transistors, since photovoltaics you want big, rather than small. But stick these on the roof of your house, on your car, in windows... you'll be pouring electricity into the power grid.
LED lightbulbs - Having converted to compact flourescents, I can say they are better than incandescents. Much much cooler (you can unscrew them while they're still on), with a nice feature of starting out dimmer than normal and brightening to full brightness in under a minute, so you aren't blinded while turning on your bathroom light in the middle of the night. But compact flourescents and incandescents are still big and wasteful. I can't wait for the LED lightbulbs, that will eventually be cheaper and brighter and better than current lightbulb technology.
Was at dave and busters today. Very depressing sight there. Only racing games, shooting games, sports games, and fighting games in the arcade, along with your standard money eating ticket machines. Looks like the beat em up and scrolling shooters genre is nonexistant there.
On the DS vs PSP wars, the DS seems to be making a comeback in Japan. It has about a 1million unit advantage over the PSP in total sales, but in 2005, the PSP has been outselling the DS for much of the year. But since the middle of April, the DS has been killing the PSP, thanks to Kirby, Nintendogs, Naruto, and some new colors. Why do I care? I'm going to get a DS when Castlevania DoS comes out, and I want the system to be dominant, so all the other good games come out for it.
I finished watch Full Metal Panic today. The humor episodes are still good, but the action episodes were definitely much, much better the second time around. Maybe because I watched it on a 25" screen rather than the 14" monitor like the first time. Going to have to wait for the Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu collection to come out... in about 2 years from now. And Kyoto Animation's Full Metal Panic: The Second Raid airs sometime this year (summer I think?). I gotta pick up the first 2 volumes of the manga too...
Photovoltaic cells - If these get mass produced at the same economy of scale as regular integrated circuits, the cost per kilowatt hour could be fantasitic. Of course, you don't have the scaling factor that you get with regular transistors, since photovoltaics you want big, rather than small. But stick these on the roof of your house, on your car, in windows... you'll be pouring electricity into the power grid.
LED lightbulbs - Having converted to compact flourescents, I can say they are better than incandescents. Much much cooler (you can unscrew them while they're still on), with a nice feature of starting out dimmer than normal and brightening to full brightness in under a minute, so you aren't blinded while turning on your bathroom light in the middle of the night. But compact flourescents and incandescents are still big and wasteful. I can't wait for the LED lightbulbs, that will eventually be cheaper and brighter and better than current lightbulb technology.
Was at dave and busters today. Very depressing sight there. Only racing games, shooting games, sports games, and fighting games in the arcade, along with your standard money eating ticket machines. Looks like the beat em up and scrolling shooters genre is nonexistant there.
On the DS vs PSP wars, the DS seems to be making a comeback in Japan. It has about a 1million unit advantage over the PSP in total sales, but in 2005, the PSP has been outselling the DS for much of the year. But since the middle of April, the DS has been killing the PSP, thanks to Kirby, Nintendogs, Naruto, and some new colors. Why do I care? I'm going to get a DS when Castlevania DoS comes out, and I want the system to be dominant, so all the other good games come out for it.
I finished watch Full Metal Panic today. The humor episodes are still good, but the action episodes were definitely much, much better the second time around. Maybe because I watched it on a 25" screen rather than the 14" monitor like the first time. Going to have to wait for the Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu collection to come out... in about 2 years from now. And Kyoto Animation's Full Metal Panic: The Second Raid airs sometime this year (summer I think?). I gotta pick up the first 2 volumes of the manga too...
Monday, May 09, 2005
RC car racing, Kekkaishi
So I was out biking around Fremont on Saturday. At the Hub, there was a group of people racing RC cars on a track that was marked out in the Target parking lot. RC cars are FAST nowadays. And I was really impressed by how well the drivers were able to control their cars as they zipped along the track.
I also picked up Kekkaishi at Borders the other day. Volume 1 is decent so far. We'll see if it can continue to stay good.
I also picked up Kekkaishi at Borders the other day. Volume 1 is decent so far. We'll see if it can continue to stay good.
Thursday, May 05, 2005
Emma, Vampire Game, Genshiken
Emma is probably my favorite show of the new season. Can you believe women used to play tennis in this kind of clothing in the late Victorian Era?
Ichigo 100% tv is still a lot of cheesy fanservice in a nice harem package.
[insert inappropriate image here]
I wouldn't mind seeing the manga come over, considering the selection of fanservice manga that is currently available here (DearS? Love Hina? Battle Vixens? Maico 2010? argh!). Funny thing is, Borders is already selling the Japanese tanks of Ichigo 100% (at a huge markup).
Anyway, I picked up Vampire Game 11 the other day, and it is an awesome volume. Of course, Ishtar is the kind of character that I love, basically a fantasy version of the blond ditz, and Darres is always getting screwed because of her.
Also picked up Genshiken, which is a pretty good look at a group of Otaku in Japan. The manga version of Saki definitely looks a lot more cultured and stylish than the anime version. Oh, and I still HATE the $10.99 price tag that Del Rey puts on their manga.
Oh, and it still looks like I'm the black sheep in terms of achieving life goals out of all my relatives in my generation. Lets just say that all the ones older than me are what I would consider more "successful" and the ones younger than me are way ahead of where I was when I was their age.
Of course, I'm pretty pleased with how far I've gotten doing as little as possible to succeed. Only taking the SAT once, even though it was one of the lowest in my circle of high school friends and that I scored lower on my math than on my verbal. Only taking 2 AP tests in high school. Never doing any extracurricular activities in high school. No summer camps, or summer jobs, or musical intraments, or any of that annoying crap. In college, never doing research or internships or any of those things that get you ahead in the game. Only getting a bachelors degree, even though EVERYONE in my family thought I should get at least a masters degree. And of course, nothing is happening on the relationship side ;)
Ichigo 100% tv is still a lot of cheesy fanservice in a nice harem package.
[insert inappropriate image here]
I wouldn't mind seeing the manga come over, considering the selection of fanservice manga that is currently available here (DearS? Love Hina? Battle Vixens? Maico 2010? argh!). Funny thing is, Borders is already selling the Japanese tanks of Ichigo 100% (at a huge markup).
Anyway, I picked up Vampire Game 11 the other day, and it is an awesome volume. Of course, Ishtar is the kind of character that I love, basically a fantasy version of the blond ditz, and Darres is always getting screwed because of her.
Also picked up Genshiken, which is a pretty good look at a group of Otaku in Japan. The manga version of Saki definitely looks a lot more cultured and stylish than the anime version. Oh, and I still HATE the $10.99 price tag that Del Rey puts on their manga.
Oh, and it still looks like I'm the black sheep in terms of achieving life goals out of all my relatives in my generation. Lets just say that all the ones older than me are what I would consider more "successful" and the ones younger than me are way ahead of where I was when I was their age.
Of course, I'm pretty pleased with how far I've gotten doing as little as possible to succeed. Only taking the SAT once, even though it was one of the lowest in my circle of high school friends and that I scored lower on my math than on my verbal. Only taking 2 AP tests in high school. Never doing any extracurricular activities in high school. No summer camps, or summer jobs, or musical intraments, or any of that annoying crap. In college, never doing research or internships or any of those things that get you ahead in the game. Only getting a bachelors degree, even though EVERYONE in my family thought I should get at least a masters degree. And of course, nothing is happening on the relationship side ;)
Wednesday, May 04, 2005
I'm still alive.
I haven't posted in a while, been too busy playing Xcom and crap. I'll update a bit later.
