Deconstructing A Formula: Trigun and Trinity Blood- Part 2: Analysis- Trigun
MORE SPOILERS D=

Trigun follows the adventures of Vash the Stampede, a legendary gunman whose skill is only matched by his penchant for flagrant and flamboyant destruction—so much so that he’s earned a sixty billion dollar bounty on his head, and has been classified as the first human natural disaster. At least, that’s what he’s made out to be. In reality, while he is truly a gunman of incredible skill, he has taken an oath never to kill a living being, and much of the destruction that is pinned on him is actually the fault of an organization known as the Gung Ho Guns that constantly hunts him. The Gung Ho Guns are the minions of Millions Knives, Vash’s twin brother, who has decided that he is a superior being in every way to normal humans, and that in order to purify the world, he has to exterminate humanity and repopulate it with a more perfect species. Along the way, Vash is accompanied by Milly Thompson and Meryl Strife, insurance agents tasked with reducing the damage caused by the first human natural disaster, as well as Nicholas D. Wolfwood, a priest with a spotted past, a massive cross-shaped machine gun as his weapon, and the skill to use it effectively. One of the defining characteristics of this style of storytelling is that all of the secondary characters play the role of foil to the main character in one way or another. In the case of Trigun, Vash is accompanied by Meryl Strife and Milly Thompson, agents of the Bernardelli Insurance Company. Each one represents an opposition to Vash’s personality. Meryl can best be described as the straight man in the trio. Her adherence to order and protocol almost invariably conflicts with Vash’s carefree nature, which tends to cause tension between the two, as it is Meryl’s job to try and restrain Vash and prevent him from causing even more damage that her company has to cover. Meanwhile, Milly shows a different side of Vash. Milly is rash, often thinking before she does things, and is controlled primarily by her emotions, which tend to pull her all over the place, dragging Vash invariably to her aid. Wolfwood, on the other hand, is a much more direct foil. Despite being a preacher and professed holy man, he also has incredible skill with firearms, and is later revealed to be a member of the Gung Ho Guns tasked with keeping surveillance on Vash and later killing him. The main conflict comes from the fact that Wolfwood’s main method of dealing with threats is far more direct than Vash’s, and he has no qualms about killing his opponents, and would often do so if not restrained by Vash.

Of course, there can be no great quest without an enemy to oppose the main character. This enemy is Millions Knives, twin brother of Vash the Stampede and leader of the Gung Ho Guns. While his motives are hidden for the majority of the series, the second to last episode is composed entirely of backstory, something that is vital to this type of show, as we generally come in with less knowledge of the world and the characters than is necessary to piece together the plot. Vash and Knives are members of an unknown humanoid race found during a spaceflight to find a suitable new planet to replace Earth after all of its natural resources are used up. They appear human, but are immortal—While Vash and Knives both appear to be no older than their middle-to-late twenties, they are actually 116 years old, and their heritage affords them supernatural durability and reflexes. While Vash believes that this puts him in a position to become a protector for humanity in a new and dangerous environment, Knives thinks that humanity has become superfluous, and that they are nothing more than inferior pests to be exterminated. This leads up to the climactic final conflict between the two, where Vash refuses to kill his brother, and instead simply incapacitates him, picks him up, and walks off into the desert. A prime example of the Open Ending, if there ever was one. The storyline has been wrapped up, but it’s clear that the main character’s journey is far from over.

03:42 PM PDT Permalink |

Deconstructing A Formula: Trigun and Trinity Blood- Part 1: Criteria and Formula
Yet more SPOILER ALERTS abound in this article.

I was tasked with writing a critical essay in a field that I have expertise on in English, so of course, I wrote on Anime. Specifically, the differences and similarities between Trigun and Trinity Blood.

Over the past few years, Japanese Animation, or Anime, has been steadily growing in the entertainment industry, with popular series popping up everywhere, conventions being held across the country that attract thousands of die-hard fans apiece, and more and more companies are getting in on the lucrative business that is importing new series and translating them for American audiences. And while the industry continues growing and new series continue to be released, some of the best Anime to come out is many years old, written before certain themes or ideas became clichéd or outdated.

There are a number of criteria by which an Anime series can be judged. Generally, many of the criteria overlap with those used to judge movies, but a case can be made that more scrutiny is placed on some points due to the vastly increased amount of time spent per series—Movies last two to three hours a piece, while the shortest series is generally at least thirteen episodes or just over six hours long. As such, the basis for judging an Anime series is slightly different. The most important is characterization. Given how long a series lasts, the viewer is going to be tied to the characters in the show for a very long time. As such, having well-developed, convincing, and captivating characters is the most important element of any series. And with that comes the need to completely build and reinforce the relationships between the characters. A character’s true colors are shown by the way he or she interacts with the other characters in the show, so this is the most important part of effectively creating a compelling character. Another major part of any series is staying true to its genre. If a series is characterized as Action, then it should carry with it a large amount of well-choreographed action scenes to captivate its audience. A Romance series should capitalize on the interaction between the male and female leads. And of course, the ending gets a special mention.

It should be intuitive that a series should always wrap up all loose ends before the grand finale of the show. There are two main ways of doing this: the Closed Ending and the Closed Ending. As endings go, the Closed Ending is the less common of the two, characterized by an ending in which the majority of the cast either leaves before the end of the series or is killed in the final few episodes. It’s rather blunt, and difficult to effectively implement, but this blunt nature results in a more tied-together resolution that ends the story in the most direct manner possible. The Open Ending is generally characterized by having a closing scene that opens up a number of possibilities for the characters involved, but not going far enough into the story to warrant continuing the series. This has the effect of never truly ending the show, but instead allowing the audience to construct its own ending, and creating an atmosphere where the story can continue on forever. However, in the case of the Open Ending, care must be taken to not leave too much of an opening and to ensure that what occurs in the story is fully wrapped up before opening up anything further.

It’s an unfortunate fact that most every plotline in existence has been done before, so it’s hard to find new subject matter to base a show off of. However, many series will use very similar plotlines structure-wise, yet by their handling of the characters and the setting, creates a very different experience. There are two in particular that stand out as having a very similar basic framework, yet having a very different experience for the viewer. These two series are Trigun and Trinity Blood. The shows are very, very different, but at their heart, they all have the same storyline progression. It is an often-used storyline—The main character is a wanderer with no real aim, completing various tasks and missions wherever he goes, meeting allies who act as foils, as well as enemies who all have ties to a hidden mastermind, who almost invariably turns out to be a person from the main character’s past, either by blood relation or previous experience. While the details are never readily available, they are almost always portrayed as an ultimate evil, something akin to Adolf Hitler if he took up baby-eating.

To Be Continued...
02:52 PM PDT Permalink |

Shoddy Battle- Taking The Grind Out Of Poke-Battling
One of the biggest problems with RPGs, I find, is the endless grind that comes with leveling and getting items and stuff. This applies triple for MMORPGs, where the only real gameplay element in effect is random grinding- Kill some stuff, loot their corpses, walk ten feet, repeat. For hours and hours on end. But at the same time, it's an integral part of any RPG-style system. This goes for the Pokemon games as well. You have to find the Pokemon that you want, then level them up, evolve them, get the moves you want for them, and in the case of serious upper-tier play, breeding over and over again to get decent IVs or Egg Moves, just to have that perfect team.

Or you can be lazy like me and do the next best thing- Shoddy Battle. Shoddy Battle is a Pokemon simulator that is meant to give all the fun and satisfaction of creating a fun and powerful Pokemon team without the nuisance of having to grind them yourself. The thing is that Shoddy Battle provides the same experience without having to buy the games or put the massive amount of grind time into the game. You can build a team out of whatever Pokemon you want, with any natures, EVs, items, and moves that they can have, and then use either the official Shoddy Battle server or one of the many publically hosted servers. On a server, you can set up your own team, and then either challenge players or let the Find Match function find one for you. There's some lag on the Official Server from time to time, but otherwise, it's usually fine.

If you ever want to challenge me, or just to chat with me, my SN on Shoddy Battle is PH34R-B0T. Hit me up, it's always nice to hear from readers. Until Next Time...
01:15 PM PDT Permalink |

How NOT To Screw Up An Ending
Just like last week, let me start off the blog by saying that there will be spoilers in this blog post. Now, if you've been following my recommendations, you've watched everything that I'm about to talk about in this blog, so you should be safe. I am of the belief that the most important part of any story is the ending. You can have amazing detail, storyline, and everything else that makes something great, and if you flub up the ending, all that becomes worthless. But enough being negative. Since I wrote up what makes an ending BAD last time, I'll be exploring what makes an ending flow well and bring good closure to the series. This blog will be broken up into the two main types of endings: Open and Closed, and will go in-depth into what discerns the two as well as examples of how they're done well.

The Closed Ending

Closed Endings are endings in which the story has completely ended. There's really nothing more for the main character(s) after this, no real adventure left. What's happened happened, and there's not much left. This type of ending is less common, but from time to time, it carries with it more power than another ending would. The most extreme case of the Closed Ending is Neon Genesis Evangelion's alternate ending in End of Evangelion. The apocalypse has come, and the entirety of the human race has died out... with the exception of those lucky enough to be housed in a great big flesh and armor mech- Shinji Ikari and Asuka Langley Soryu. So... when you're the last guy and girl on the face of the planet, what's the logical thing to do? Obviously, Shinji has removed himself from all logical thinking at this point, because he proceeds to turn around and strangle Asuka to death. Then, with the grim realization that he's the last living human being, he simply sets himself down on the beach to think. A slightly more subtle form of this is the ending to Cowboy Bebop. Faye's run off to continue her cheating, scamming, and general rambling about the universe; Jet's left alone on the Bebop to plot his next move; Ed's found her father and finally has her own family; and Spike, having lost Julia and finally taken revenge against Vicious, dies on the steps of the Syndicate Headquarters. It's a beautiful ending to say the least, and it wraps things up nicely for everyone involved. Sure, everyone else's stories go on, but there's really nothing new in store for them. Just more of the same.

The Open Ending

Open Endings are far more common, and as such, get messed up far more often. The Open Ending is a method of ending a series where the characters have no set path after the ending, so there's no real ending to the series. The big issue is that this is NOT an excuse to leave "loose ends" all over the place thinking that the viewer can tie them up on their own. First off, I'll parallel two endings that might as well be the same ending... except one was good, and one was damn bad. The two series in question are Trigun and Trinity Blood, and Trinity Blood basically did everything wrong that Trigun did right. Since I already laid out Trinity Blood's sins, I'll be covering Trigun today. First off, Trigun spent an entire episode laying out the backstory between Vash and Knives. And at the end of the epic battle between the two (there was actually an END, Trinity Blood just kind of cut it off somewhere in the middle, leaving us to wonder what the hell happened), instead of finishing Knives off, Vash just simply picked Knives up and walked off to deal with him at some point in the future. Meryl and Milly end up going back to the Bernardelli Insurance Company, their stint with Vash having come to an end, and Vash going off to deal with the future however it presents itself. Ties everything up nicely, and lets the viewer wonder about what happens after the ending.

However, I have to say that, from start to an AMAZING finish, Elfen Lied still holds the title of best series I've seen in a long time. In the last episode, Lucy and Kohda finally reconcile their incredibly troubled past and realize that they actually do love each other, and that despite the whole Lucy killing Kohda's family thing, there's far more to her than just the misanthropic, homicidal part of her psyche that all Diclonius share. But even with such a revelation, Lucy realizes that she's got to atone for her sins no matter what, and goes off to face the soldiers that have been dispatched to hunt her down. Gunfire erupts and Lucy's one remaining horn flies into the air, shattered. The remain characters find themselves once more around the dinner table- Kohda, Yuka, Miyu, and Nana, and realize that Yuka has mistakenly set a place for Lucy, regardless of the fact that she's no longer around. As they're about to eat, the dog starts barking. Kohda goes to answer the door, and sees an unknown figure behind the shoji screen at the gate. The music box that has recurred so much throughout the series ticks down to nothing, and as the grandfather clock that Lucy broke in the beginning of the series strikes 8:00, it begins to ring again. The series ends without anything further, leaving the viewer with only ideas of what follows. Absolutely amazing given the depth and power of the rest of the series. No loose ends are left, no characters unexplained. There aren't words for how amazing I think Elfen Lied is as a series, and I'll probably end up re-watching it because of this.

All in all, there are plenty of ways to do an ending right, but plenty more ways to screw one up. Here's to hoping that the remainder of my viewing falls in the first category rather than the second. Until Next Time...
04:03 PM PST Permalink |

How To Screw Up An Ending In Three Easy Steps
First off, let it be known that THIS BLOG ENTRY WILL HAVE LOTS OF SPOILERS for various series, the endings of which I will use as examples of either good or bad endings to series. It's been a rather alarming trend that a lot of the shows I've been watching have: the really, REALLY bad ending to a really, REALLY good show. This has been popping up everywhere recently, and it's been bothering me a lot. So, to hopefully help better understand the mechanics of an ending, I'll be laying out what I think makes an ending good or bad (mostly bad) as well as examples of each. Again, THIS BLOG ENTRY WILL HAVE SPOILERS IN IT. Consider yourself warned.

1: Characters Out Of Nowhere

The foundation of a good show is a well-defined cast of chracters. Any good show will have its viewer feel as if they know everyone involved, and each of the characters will be a well-developed, deep backstory. However, every once in a while, a show feels the need to just randomly throw new characters into the mix near the end, and have them be major villains to be defeated by the heroes for no real reason. Most recently, the three shows that were most guilty of this were Berserk, Real Bout High School, and most notably, Trinity Blood. In Berserk, the last two episodes were so vastly removed, including a new villain (the king of the demons) who had come to turn Griffith into the lord of Midgard, the land in which Berserk takes place. This would be okay... if the show had even HINTED at this from the beginning. However, it never even tried to give its audience a hint of how the show would end, which was just confusing beyond belief. In Real Bout High School, a villain popped up in the last 15 minutes of the show, with no backstory and no real reason for existing, got jumped, and was defeated by the heroes. And in Trinity Blood, Cain Nightlord, Abel's world-destroying brother, decided to show up without warning and start destroying stuff all over the place. Introducing characters out of the blue is a BIG no-no, and really tends to screw up endings. There's only one show where it was pulled off effectively- Elfen Lied. The legendary third-generation Diclonius that was one of the big villains showed up. However, they spent the better part of an episode going over her story, and made her a major part of the ending, which was a good way to handle a late arrival in a show.

2: Just say no to the Deus Ex Machina

Deus Ex Machina literally means Device of the Gods. It refers to how in ancient plays, when things looked bleakest, one of the Gods would roll up on everyone and fix everything. The Deus Ex Machina is actually really quite a cheap play, a way to fix things without even trying. When the writers really can't think of any other way to fix the screw-ups that they've unleashed on the main characters, the Deus Ex Machina makes it all better. Trinity Blood was quite guilty of this in the end of the show. A bad judgment call leaves Abel on the wrong side of a vicious attack, which quite abruptly ends our hero's life. Yet, when things look bleak, Cardinal Sforza manages to conjure up some black liquid from Abel's mother (another character that never really gets explained) to bring him back to life, just in time to stop Abel from destroying everything. Nothing about this black liquid is ever explained: Where it's from, what it is, what it does, how it works... only that it brings Abel back to life at full power somehow. Cheap beyond belief. Berserk does the same, but in the opposite. Things are going smoothly... up until the point in time where the "Egg of Kings" turns out to summon a bunch of demons to take over the world and make Griffith the lord of the world. No warning, just LOL SUP DEMONS.

3: Backstory, Backstory, Backstory

Backstory is the explanation of things that happen before the beginning of a show. Some shows, like Gungrave, are ALL backstory. The entirety of the show is a flashback, with the exclusion of the first two and last 4 episodes. Backstory is one of the ways that late arrival characters can be reconciled, by showing what makes them so evil or good or powerful or whatever they're supposed to be. Trigun does this well. Knives shows up four episodes before the ending, but the second to last episode, Rem Saverem, is ENTIRELY constructed out of the backstory between Vash and Knives. Trinity Blood, however, seems to just ignore this. Cain shows up, and they go into a small backstory sequence. This sequence introduces new characters that have never been seen before, as well as some odd plot points. The point of backstory is that it ANSWERS questions that come up in the introduction of new characters. Yet the backstory behind Cain and Abel does nothing but create new questions that never get answered.

Next time, I'll be going over how a series can end correctly, as well as more examples of good and bad endings. Until Next Time...
01:28 PM PST Permalink |

Trinity Blood- Yet Another Disappointment
I'm sensing a trend here. A trend that is rather alarming, unfortunate, and just tends to get on my nerves. This is the third series that has done this to me recently, and has really annoyed the hell out of me recently. Series' that are AWESOME throughout, then get to the end, and suddenly and mysteriously ruin themselves, either by adding new characters out of the blue, using convoluted plot points that make no sense in the context of the show, leaving out key details of backstory, or leaving relationships unresolved after everything is said and done. Most unfortunately, Trinity Blood, the latest series that I set my sights on, is guilty of all of these sins that make an excellent show fall apart in the home stretch.

Armageddon has occurred, and much of the world has been thrown into turmoil. All would have been lost, were it not for the guidance of the two great powers in the new world- The Vatican, seat of power of what appears to be the new Holy Roman Empire; and The Empire, land of the Methuselah, a race of vampires residing in the area that was once the Middle East. An uneasy peace holds between the two sides, a kind of Cold War where petty conflicts in the buffer countries that prevents a full-blown invasion on either side. This uneasy peace is held together by members of the AX, a team that could be considered the "Special Forces" of the Vatican- While the Inquisitorial Committee could be considered a broadsword, a weapon with great power but little precision, the AX would be considered more of a scalpel, a directed team with the skill to handle whatever may come their way, but also the diplomatic prowess to keep the peace and make sure that a conflict doesn't come to blows (though they don't exactly demonstrate that much in the show).

There are a number of agents of the AX, but one of the higher-ranked ones would be Father Abel Nightroad, a clumsy, foolish priest with a consistent lament for his lack of money, and a penchant for tea so sugared up that it resembles something more similar to a syrup than an actual beverage. And yet for all his seemingly inefficient style of investigation, Abel tends to be incredibly useful in the clutch. He goes from ditzy to serious at a moment's notice, and when things look grim, he always shows up to save the day. This is bolstered by the fact that Abel has a powerful secret that gives him the power to protect those he holds dear. Abel, seemingly being a relic of a greater time, is a Cruznik- a being made of flesh fused with Nano-machines to create a kind of uber-vampire, capable of drinking the blood of other vampires, as well as brandishing a massive scythe to cut down those who stand against him.

This show was absolutely AMAZING from start to... almost finish. But the last story arc brought with it all of the errors that I stated in the first paragraph, and those are just so damning that I can't say I advocate this show. It's excellent, but be prepared for a bit of a hollow ending.

Until Next Time...
01:29 PM PST Permalink |

Super Smash Brothers Brawl: The Next Generation of the Nintendo Beat-em-up
Every console has a defining game that makes people go out and snap it up as quickly as they can. (Except for Sony- that's one of their crippling failures). As Halo 3 was for the XBox 360, so is Super Smash Brothers Brawl for the Wii. Easily one of the best games for a new console by FAR, Brawl is one of the most hyped game releases in a very long time, eclipsing many of the other big releases of the year. Not that it doesn't deserve to be- it's one of the best games of the year, easily. The third in the series of popular games, Super Smash Brothers Brawl is based on a very simple, very effective idea. Take all the various heroes, villains, and main characters from all the most popular games, throw them into an arena, and have them beat the hell out of one another. Simple in concept, flawless in execution, the Super Smash Brothers series has been a major part of the Nintendo franchise for a long time coming, from the original Super Smash Brothers for the Nintendo 64, to Super Smash Brothers Melee for the Gamecube, to Super Smash Brothers Brawl for the Wii.

I went to a release party at the local Game Crazy, and it was absolutely massive, Over 400 copies had been pre-ordered, and about half of them were to be picked up at the stroke of midnight when the game first went on sale. They had a huge tournament, where the winner got a free copy of Brawl. Some excellent play went down. The winner won his best 2 out of 3 match with absolutely excellent play of Marth and Bowser. I got to get some decent play in, playing for the first time in about a year. I wasn't THAT rusty, playing a decent Captain Falcon, Samus, and Marth, but I really could have done quite better. In any case, I really hope to finally buy my Wii and grab a copy of Brawl ASAP.

Until Next Time...
02:09 PM PST Permalink |

Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney - The New Generation of Justice
I'm such a liar.

I swore up and down that I wouldn't like this game. I mean, it had so much going against it. First off, they decided that the best way to make the series fresh was to almost entirely discard the cast of the Phoenix Wright games in exchange for a new set of characters. No more Edgeworth. No Gumshoe. None of the Fey family... In my mind, it was a recipe for disaster. Fixing what isn't broken never worked well for any game series. And yet, despite the fact that I was so vehemently opposed to the IDEA of Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, I found myself last week in my local Game Crazy once again, plunking down the 35 dollars for the game.

And you know what? It wasn't that bad. It was actually a lot better than I'd expected it to be. They created a thoroughly decent cast of characters that, while not as amusing as the cast of Phoenix Wright, still add a lot to the game. Apollo is (as expected) the same kind of nervous, inexperienced, not very confident attorney. Trucy is just too freakin' cute... and while she's probably my favorite character of the game, I'd take Maya any day over her. Phoenix pops up again, sort of in the same role that Mia played in the PW games. And the new detective, Ema Skye, is one of the few returning characters from the old games, being the sidekick character for "Rise From The Ashes," the DS-only case that was added to the first Phoenix Wright game.

However, here's the part of the review that I've been dreading writing. My first problem... is that the game is short. WAY short. To put it in perspective, I spent more time beating the final case of Trials & Tribulations than I did beating the entire game of Apollo Justice. This is a devastating weak point, given that the game has absolutely nil in replay value. My second real qualm with the game is just how... not compelling the last case is compared to the last cases of the other games. Each of the other cases has had a main villain- the real murderer- who is just such a reprehensible human being that when you finally lock them away... And that just isn't there in the last case of Apollo Justice.

But by far, my biggest issue is the prosecutor. I actually liked Klavier Gavin... and therein lies the problem. Edgeworth was always condescending, overconfident, and knew what you were going to say before you even said it, and already had an answer. Manfred... was everything Edgeworth was (like mentor, like student), but to a MUCH greater degree. Franziska was abusive, yet was always able to shut down your case to such a great degree that recovery seemed impossible. And Godot... was consistently so aloof, never being bothered by anything, and always knowing exactly where the weak point of your case was, and exploiting that to the fullest. Compare that to Gavin... He almost seemed to be COACHING you through the case.

In any case, Apollo Justice is a decent addition to the series. It may not live up to the high standard set by the other games, but it's still decent in its own right. Until Next Time...
02:43 PM PST Permalink |

Your Webcomic is Bad, and You Should Feel Bad
No, I don't mean you specifically. However, it's pretty easy to spot bad ones... most of the time.

Good thing there's John Solomon, the man behind Your Webcomic is Bad, and You Should Feel Bad. Your Webcomic Is Bad is a blog written by John Solomon (a pseudonym) that searches the internet for webcomics of mediocre or bad quality, then posts long, involved rants about why each webcomic is bad. Now, anyone can talk down about a webcomic, but the thing that sets this blog's reviews apart from others is that the author actually takes the time to read through the comic and write about specific instances of bad writing, art style, and general lack of depth in character development and dialog. Combine this style of writing and reviewing with his standard anger and hate-filled rants, and it becomes an incredibly amusing blog.

One of the excerpts from his blog on Dominic Deegan, one of the worst webcomics that I've ever read:

"Dominic Deegan is a webcomic so bad you'd think it was hosted on an ancient Indian burial ground. It's so unwaveringly terrible it might as well be a universal constant. It's so bad that it spoils milk. It's so bad that your computer will physically smell when you load the page, an aroma of brimstone, decaying meat and burning feces that will linger for days afterward. It is so bad that none of what I have just said does justice to how bad it is."

Check out the rest of his work at Your Webcomic is Bad and You Should Feel Bad. Until Next Time...
02:20 PM PST Permalink |

Manga As The New Medium
Manga and Graphic Novels have exploded in popularity in the past couple years. Acting as a revival of the popularity of old-school comic books, but integrating complex stories with heavy action in order to create an atmosphere that draws in readers. This atmosphere has recently found itself not only used as a source of entertainment, but also as a way to make old ideas accessible to a new audience. To this end, Ajinbayo Akinsiku has released The Manga Bible: From Genesis to Revelation, a graphic novel version of the Bible aimed to make the original text much more accessible to a younger audience. With a greater emphasis on action and faster pacing, Akinsiku hopes to bring the Bible to people who are normally too intimidated to take the first step.

One notable part of the Manga Bible is its presentation of old characters with modern interpretations. Characters such as Noah are given a fresh model. During the counting of the Ark's animals, a miscount leads Noah to exclaim, "That'€™s 11,344 animals? Arggh! I'€™ve lost count again. I'€™m going to have to start from scratch!" On the other side of the coin, Christ is shown as a touch of a revolutionary, stirring up trouble and acting like a general tough guy rather than the traditional savior that he's portrayed as.

You can read more about this in this NY Times article. Until Next Time...
05:53 PM PST Permalink |

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann- Drilling Through To The Heavens
Once again, I'm constantly on the lookout for new and cool Anime series to watch. Unfortunately, my sources are dwindling. However, I sometimes come across a couple amazing finds now and then... Case in point? Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. An anime so excellent that despite the fact that it hasn't actually been released in America yet, it's still managed to find its way around the internet, garnering incredible amounts of praise everywhere it goes. Eager to see if the hype was actually true or not, I went and grabbed one of the many fansubbed versions floating around on the net. What I found was that Tengen Toppa is an excellent series that deserves all of the praise it gets (something that I rarely can say about many Anime).

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann takes place in a bleak world where every human being is confined to underground villages, forced to live on meager resources and dig their way through the ground to expand their village and get more ground for their insubstantial lives. However, there is one that wishes to break free of all of this: Kamina, a fiery-spirited warrior whose own short-lived experiences on the surface create in him a hunger to return and make his mark on the world. The problem is that Kamina's viewed as a troublemaker by everyone in the village. Everyone but Simon, that is. Simon is Kamina's trusted friend, as well as one of the premier diggers in the city. But when he finds a mysterious drill pendant, and a small robot to which the pendant seems to act as a key, Simon and Kamina's luck turns around.

As this is happening, the peace of the village is disturbed by a couple invaders- Yoko, a woman from the surface wielding a gigantic rifle, and a gigantic robot called a Ganmen. The two arrive locked in fierce battle, and things are looking grim for Yoko- that is, until Simon shows up with his newly-found Lagann (The name given to the mini-Ganmen found by Simon) and defuses the situation. Of course, this is the chance that Kamina's been waiting for to bust through to the surface and make his mark. But when Simon and Kamina get to the surface, they find that even existing on the surface is a monumental task, as the Ganmen, robots controlled by the beastmen who run the surface world, mount daily attacks on the last pocket of resistance on the surface. Recognizing this as his chance to make his mark, Kamina devotes himself to freeing the surface world from the beastmen, whatever it takes. Dragging along Simon for the ride, the fight for survival on the surface may have the strength to launch a counter-attack.

While the show seems straight-forward, there's much more to it than my meager plot synopsis can show. Tengen Toppa is a lot more than your average mecha anime, and it has EASILY earned a place in my top ten anime of all time. It does, however, have that "Trigun" feel to it, where it's all fun and games up to the turning point, where the real drama kicks in. Still, there are twists and turns around every corner in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, and this makes it a phenomenal series to watch. I eagerly await its release in North America.

Until Next Time...
02:21 PM PST Permalink |

Immaterial and Missing Power- Touhou Shooter-Fighter Hybrid
I have a friend that is always up on the oddest games. In addition, he's a HUGE fan of all the fighting games that are out there. (King of Fighters, Street Fighter, Dead Or Alive, and especially the fan-made general fighting game console MUGEN) So every once in a while, he tells me about a game that I should play, and I usually humor him. I've never been that much of a fighting game fan, so I'm usually skeptical of his suggestions. But every once in a while, there's a gem that he tosses me. The most recent of those is Immaterial and Missing Power, a shooter-fighter hybrid from the Touhou Project, a series of arcade-style shooting games. While the main game is in Japanese, almost all of the menus are in English, so it's not impossible to maneuver through the game.

Immaterial and Missing Power, or IaMP for short, is primarily a fighting game. However, what sets it apart from other fighting games is the control system. All of the characters are rather slow in melee- at least slower than in most fighting games. However, when you are a certain distance away from your opponent, your controls fire projectiles rather than using melee attacks. Using projectiles requires energy that regenerates quickly, but if you fire too many projectiles at the same time, you'll be too drained to use any more, as well as reducing your ability to block effectively. Projectiles can be grazed (avoided) by either using certain attacks with grazing frames or dashing through them. For this reason, the gameplay of Immaterial and Missing Power is a balance between being able to mix it up effectively in melee and fighting well at range. Each character has their own moveset that emphasizes their own strengths and weaknesses, and each character is different to master. There are 11 characters in all: 6 standard, four secret, and one extra.

Reimu Hakurei- Generally balanced between melee and ranged. Very maneuverable. A good beginning character.

Marisa Kirisame- Another generally balanced character, with slightly more emphasis on melee attacks.

Alice Margatroid- Fights using puppets. For this reason, many of her attacks have significant windup, so it takes a bit more skill to use her effectively. Very effective if used correctly.

Sakuya Izayoi- Fights using thrown knives. A good balanced character, focusing on speed and agility. Works on the principle that you can't hurt what you can't hit.

Patchouli Knowledge- VERY good projectile ability, but incredibly slow and weak in melee. The key to using her is to fight at a distance as much as possible, wearing the enemy down over time.

Youmu Konpaku- Incredibly effective in melee, and very maneuverable. However, slow and not very powerful in range. The key is to get in close and fight up in the opponent's face.

Remilia Scarlet- The first secret character. Easily the fastest character in the game, and thus very effective with hit-and-run attacks. Medium power at range, but the ability to switch between melee and ranged quickly and seamlessly covers this weakness.

Yuyuko Saigyouji- Very, VERY slow movement, but great power and area in her attacks, with decent execution speed. Hard to get used to, but very strong.

Yukari Yakumo- Decent movespeed with slow, powerful attacks. If used correctly, she's rather strong, but outclassed by a number of other characters.

Suika Ibuki- The drunken oni, and boss of IaMP. Rather slow attacks, but VERY powerful. Unlike Yukari, though, she's quite fast and maneuverable, and generally has a better time landing her hits. While many of her moves are hard to hit with, if they hit, they do excellent damage.

Hong Meirin- The extra character- has no story mode, and an odd moveset. Most of her projectiles are more useful in close, so it's hard to use her effectively, as there's a VERY small window between where her projectiles kick in and where they can hit. Powerful, but hard to get used to.

The single-player is divided up into Arcade Mode and Story Mode. In Arcade Mode, you just fight your way through the characters. However, in Story Mode, you have to fight through a pre-determined set of opponents. Furthermore, these opponents have "story mode spellcards" which give them additional movesets to fight you with. Story Mode is much harder than Arcade Mode for this reason, but it's an excellent challenge. Also, through use of an open-source program, you can fight with friends over the internet. An excellent game, Immaterial and Missing Power is a fun hybrid that is sure to please any fan of either genre.

Until Next Time...
03:50 PM PST Permalink |

The Black Belt Testing

Yesterday, I completed one of the biggest milestones in my life: Getting my Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do. I've been taking Tae Kwon Do for around 10-11 years, and I've been working up to this day for most of my life.

Generally, testings aren't that big a deal: First off, it's not really a test. All of the actual testing is done beforehand in class the week before. Second, all the testing usually is is a glorified class where the people testing show off what they've learned in class. However... the Black Belt testing is different. It's basically an endurance run where over three hours, your body is taxed to its limits by drills, forms, sparring, board breaking, and the like. Somewhere in the middle of this insane ordeal, the teacher asks the question that you want to hear the least: "Why are you doing this?" Now, normally, the question would be obvious. However, the placement of the question is directly after the most difficult part of the testing, placed such that if, just for a split second, you wonder why you're actually doing it. The temptation is there to say that you don't know or that you just want to give up. But the point is that even when it comes to that, you'll still go on.

Notably difficult parts include doing all fourteen (?!?) forms back-to-back. It's hard enough to keep a couple forms in your head, but to get the black belt, you have to know ALL of the standard forms. And while each form may not be tiring in and of itself, when you put all 14 of them together, it's quite the challenge. Next comes the moment of truth. There's a kick in Tae Kwon Do, a martial art known for its kicks, where you have to step behind to do a spinning roundhouse kick. Now, while incredibly powerful and rather fast, this kick is tiring beyond belief. And... for the test, I had to do 70 of them. Seventy. Back to back. And, after only a short break, I had to do my final form. There are not words for the difficulty of this task. However, I struggled through it, and managed to make it to the end. The final test is something my father refers to as the "Circle of Death." Basically, I'm in a sparring ring, and three Black Belts are outside the ring. One at a time, they come in, rotating, so while I'm tired out, they're always fresh and ready to go. The rotating continues on for about three minutes, until one by one, the remaining two black belts come into the ring, and I have to fight all three of them off at the same time, in a small space, without being cornered or surrounded. As tough as that sounds, I actually did rather alright given the circumstances.

And at the end of it all, I can now look forward and say that no matter what I have to come up against in the future, it won't be harder than the Black Belt Testing. Until Next Time...
03:42 PM PST Permalink |

The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass- A New Twist On An Old Franchise
There's been a long-standing fight between the various console makers for control over the large Video Game market, especially with the price of a console going so high that often it comes down to choosing between one or the other. So in the end, each console has to come up with gimmicks to make it more fun. To this end, each major company has solidified their hold on the market with their specific strong suits. The XBox 360 has all the amazing, high-intensity action games- Halo 3, Call of Duty 4, etc. Sony decided to create an entire multimedia experience- High-definition video for all of their games, Blu-ray video for the PS3, and the UMD for the PSP. However, Nintendo decided to go in a different direction. "How can we change the nature of the video game, and make it more fun?" The answer? New controls. Between the Touch Screen of the DS and the motion-sensor Wii Remote and Nunchuk, the Wii and the DS have changed the way games are played.

The best example of this is the latest offering in the age-old Legend of Zelda series: The Phantom Hourglass. Controlled entirely by the touch-screen (odd for a real-time RPG), Phantom Hourglass makes full use of every single new feature of the DS to play. You yell into the microphone to call out to characters, blow on it to blow out flames and fill windmills, you can write on your map, and there's even a part of the game where you have to close the DS in order to mimic pressing the pages of a book together.

It being a Legend of Zelda game, The protagonist is, of course, Link. And, as always, you're rescuing the beautiful Princess Zelda. However, the setting has changed dramatically. Link is a young swordsman under the command of Terra, a pirate captain. Terra just so happens to be Princess Zelda, though, so it works out. Or at least it would, if she hadn't been kidnapped by an evil Ghost Ship that has been abducting people. After Link finds himself unable to board the Ghost Ship and save Terra, he washes up on an island that is home to the mysterious Oshus, who teaches Link swordplay and sends him on his way. After meeting Linebeck, the stingy, cowardly, treasure-obsessed captain of the S.S. Linebeck, Link embarks on a journey that will take him to all the corners of the map in search of the Ghost Ship, his friend Terra, and the great evil that controls the fate of all the lands.

An amazing addition to the Legend of Zelda series, The Phantom Hourglass truly shows what the DS is capable of, in grand style. Until Next Time...
11:17 PM PST Permalink |

Texhnolyze- From The Mechanical To The Spiritual
I've never been much for the mainstream Anime. Chances are, if it's been on TV, and there's a huge following, I hate it. This leads me to seek out the lesser-known shows, in hopes that the lack of hype is hiding an above-average show. What I found was an odd, off-beat drama that takes a while to start up, but once it does, becomes a complex and involved story.

Texhnolyze takes place in the dark city of Lux, a city wracked with gang warfare. The reigning power is the Orugano, a group that uses a mineral called Raffia, which is not produced anywhere but Lux, to make the integration of robotic limbs into the human body possible. This process is called Texhnolyzation, and is pioneered by a mysterious doctor obsessed with using Texhnolyzation to perfect the human form. To this end, she bestows a pioneer new model of Texhnolyze Limbs on Ichise, a former pit fighter who loses an arm and a leg in a dispute with a local gang. Through this act of charity, Ichise finds himself indebted to the Orugano, which is becoming splintered due to infighting between the various council members. And behind the scenes... there is Ran, a mysterious young girl who evidently has the power to see one of many possible futures for a person.

This show reminded me somewhat of .hack//SIGN, in that it has no real comedic value, and is light on the action, but concentrates more on the philosophical aspects and dramatic buildup of character, which can act as a turn-off to many people. And as much as I'd like to recommend this series entirely, I must say that the first couple episodes are INCREDIBLY drab and boring, and it's tough to get through them. There's barely 3 lines of dialogue in the whole first episode. However, if you can get through the first disk, the rest comes easily. Until Next Time...
05:05 PM PST Permalink |