Sunday, July 28, 2013

Quick Look! Final Spring Turn-Out!

Long time no see, though I promise it's been unintentional. I've been really busy with a number of personal things, but promise I have big things in store, including reports on completely ridiculous things I find that I can't promise as news (but as humorous, nonetheless). I'll try to start doing some more VOCALOID translations as well to fill in the gaps as they don't always take that long.

Out of the series I threw up in my last post, I only ended up following through with two of them and adding on a few others that were continuations of past series. So here's my quick look at where things stood.

Arata the Legend
I'm actually watching this one much slower, and so I haven't caught up with it yet. The reason is simply because  I want to savor the work of my favorite studio, knowing more won't be on the way until the Moretsu Pirates movie in 2014. As a series itself, it's not bad.  The theme song leaves some to be desired, and I would certainly like to see more of the shenanigans on "our" planet throughout it. It would be interesting to see Arata as...well..how others see him acting in different ways, but Satelight rarely embraces that gag. When they do it's worth it. The whole thing comes off very Avatar the Last Airbender sometimes, which isn't a bad thing. Combined with references to traditional Japanese culture on occasion, and animated splendidly, I recommend it.

Attack on Titan
This is continuing into summer, and it has every reason to. With an intense plot and high on emotion, as well as lovingly animated by the studio, it's everything an anime this season should be. Out of the spring season, I would pick it as the winner hands down. There are more secrets to be revealed, and almost every episode spawns a meme of some sort. It's even been referenced in several other anime, such as Free! in the summer season.

Flower of Evil
This anime was heavy. And it wasn't just the rotoscoping that made it that way, though it did make it interesting. I initially planned to drop it, but it's ponderous attitude and thoughtful pacing made sticking with it worth it. The anime is more real than anything I've seen in a while, perhaps since Wandering Son, and tries to look at the difficulties of being a teenager all over again. If you enjoy haunting music and an anime that watches like it's novel inspiration, check it out.

Uta no Prince Sama LOVE 2000%
Alright, this was my guilty pleasure anime. Unless you enjoy reading between the lines and picking out which boy you'd like to see with another, protagonist be damned, don't pick up this series. It's silly, full of catchy male idol songs, and pampers to fujoushi in as many humorous ways as possible. Okay, those my be exact reasons to pick it up, but if it's not your thing, there isn't really any other reason to watch it. That's what made it my guilty pleasure for the season.

Until next time!
~AAO~

Saturday, April 13, 2013

Quick Look! Spring Season 2013

Unlike the past year, this spring season is pulling me in with more shows that look to be fairly interesting. And, luckily enough, Crunchyroll has nearly all of them streaming, so that's great! A few, though, are sequels so it would be best to take a look at the first season before continuing onto the next one, such as Oreimo and Uta no Prince-sama (even I have to go back and watch Uta no Prince's first season). So let's take a look.

Yamato 2199
Okay, to be fair this one is a remake and isn't streaming on Crunchyroll, but it's a continuation of a classic and looks to be a really awesome one at that. It's very much like the original, in that there will be the Yamato space colony designed to protect humanity and, of course, the evil aliens to be fought. I would give it a watch just to see how they're doing it this time and how they plan to handle some classic material.

Karneval
This one has been in my newsfeed for promotion for about two seasons, so needless to say I'm looking forward to see if it lives up to that hype. The animation looks pretty nice, and the story is somewhat fresh as well, though it seems to be following off the "who am I" trope that most stories do these days. I'm not saying its a bad thing, as when done correctly it can really make an anime interesting. Besides, I don't think a circus themed Defense Agency in space has even been done yet. Karneval is being streamed by Funimation.

Attack on Titan
I actually don't know much about the story on this one, but the art style seems to stick so much to what I've seen of the manga that it looks really interesting. The manga, from what I can tell, goes with a grittier feeling, which I hope will translate over well from stills to animation. Attack on Titan is streaming on Crunchyroll.

HENNEKO ~ The Hentai Prince and Stony Cat
The manga this is based off of is still ongoing, and from what my friend explained to me starts off humorous and gets a little more serious. It starts off with a male protagonist who can't help but say anything perverted, painting him in a bad light, and a girl who wishes she wouldn't feel sad any more making a wish upon a stone cat said to grant wishes. The comedic bit I thought it would take would be for them to switch personalities but...they end up with worse ones instead and embark on a quest to regain who they really are. HENNEKO is streaming on Crunchyroll.

Arata the Legend
I only found out about this one when I visited Studio Satelight's website not too long ago. Based upon a manga by the same author that did Ceres, and animated by my favorite studio, it was hard to pass up. The story follows a world in which gods exist, and the shenanigans that one boy must endure...and most likely romance as well. Arata the Legend is streaming on Crunchyroll.

It seems I just keep adding more and more to my queue to see how they turn out, but as I said, this season is stacking up to be a good one.

Monday, March 4, 2013

Snow Day and Love Song [English Translation]




This is the story of a little girl
That grew up all alone
And the icy “me”

When I opened up the door
The snow was everywhere
Oh so fluffily
the snow seemed to fly through the air
Advancing at a run and resounding
with a fluffy little song
That was my rhythm

For the very first time
I played within the snow
Running and making a ball
My face was quite bright red
Within a daze I rounded out two of them
Then I stacked them onto on another
I had done it!

“My” icy body was all made
Touching you I started to melt
Sweltering now
Chilling down now
Those eyes started to look at me
I looked at you “me”
And the two of us fell into love

Within that instant even “I”
started to melt so it was the
time for goodbyes

As time flowed on
The snow was everywhere
It’s been such a long time
Since I played in the snow
We were just a little detached
from the children’s circle
in our sailor uniforms.

My friend also came along
And we chatted a bit
All together we made it
“I” was circling again
Everybody became friends
with this “me”
How happy!

The five of them were so nice I think
Chatting away
Listening too
My friend and everyone all together
And so no matter how many years passed
We can always meet on a snowy day
“We” are always right here
After having fun it’ll be time for Bye-Bye

A considerable time passed
Snow was everywhere
A tiny hand pulled against mine
From behind

The girl had become a wonderful woman
“My” heart was crying!

“My” icy body was all made
Touching you I started to melt
Sweltering now
Chilling down now
This feeling I wanted to convey to you!
At that one chance meeting
It was nice that you could find a replacement

Within that instant
You were all grown up
And it warmed up this icy person
Therefore this legend
May someday fade ­away
Even though you’ve grown up
It’s time for “see you next time!”

Thursday, February 7, 2013

A Lie and A Stuffed Animal English Transliteration [嘘とぬいぐるみ]


A Lie and a Stuffed Animal [Transliterated Lyrics]


A Lie and a Stuffed Animal

Rigu Ragu Ron Ton
Kindly chant it once for me
Do me a favor and erase these boring things

I’m not lying at all!
I promise that to you!
Those wrung out feelings will soon inflate again
“Something like magic can’t exist” ain’t really blunt
Oh, now I get it
Just shut up and you’ll be happy!

Sing-a-ring-a-ring
You and rubbish and my love
Sparkle-Sparkle-Spark
Let me polish that right on up for you
Wippa-Wippa-Win
This one thing now is quite important
This person called “I” don’t you dare defy them

Rather recently my very close friend
Has started to be distant

That’s Mimi, so you know.
“Is it your boyfriend I wonder?”
“Or a different trouble maybe?”
“Should  I ask this kid what’s making her feel glum?”
“It’s just a stuffed animal.”
You say making fun of me.
Oh, I get it now!
This boy has no dreams at all.

Sing-a-ring-a-ring
Tedious evenings and you as well
Twinkle-Twinkle-Twink
I will give you a good time
Wippa-Wippa-Win
One other most important thing
This person called “I”, follow along after them, okay.

Your so calm and always look so stylish
But you hardly ever let out a smile,  ain’t that right?
Just like that I’ll trifle with you
I’ll throw your pace all out of order
Playing around is just something I like…

I’m so sorry!

Sing-a-ring-a- ring
You and rubbish and my love
Sparkle-Sparkle-Spark
Let me polish that right on up for you
Wippa-Wippa-Win
This one thing now is quite important
This person called “I” don’t you dare defy them

Sing-a-ring-a-ring
Tedious evenings and you as well
Twinkle-Twinkle-Twink
I will give you a good time

Wippa-Wippa-Win
One other most important thing
This person called “I”, follow along after them, okay

An adult is what I’ll pretend to be
Not really doing anything at all…Oh Yea
I hate those sort of things! Yeah!

Thursday, January 31, 2013

A Very Studio SATELIGHT Season

Over the holidays I watched and started watching quite a few series, most of them from Studio SATELIGHT. It's really no secret that they're my favorite animation studio, and for good reason. Yet strangely enough their shows are dropped pretty early on. So I thought it would be fun to to take a look at where these shows shine their brightest and where they fall into a black hole. I'll try to take a look at each one individually, but I don't plan on reviewing every show, simply because I would have to pick up another and throw into my watch list. So here's a master list of what I plan on looking at, shows I've watched (or am the process of watching) in the past year.

-Aquarion EVOL

-Moretsu Pirates

-AKB0048

-Macross Frontier

Until next time.
~AAO

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Animal Crossing: New Leaf

It's been a while! If I wanted to, I could gladly review the anime I've been watching in the fall, but some of it is from summer, some of it fall, and some of it from the eighties. So instead, I thought I would do a quick post on Dobutsu Mori Tobidase! or Animal Crossing New Leaf.
When I saw that a special edition 3DS XL was coming out for it, I got pumped and decided that that was the Japanese 3DS I wanted to play my games on. Especially since I was waiting for three years...

It was a bit expensive to get, as I missed out on preorders, but was really worth it. It came with the game installed on the SD card, and it's really just nice to play it on such a big screen. The resolution is amazing. There are so many unboxing pictures out and about that I would feel silly posting my own (especially since it sprouts a Christmas Elmo and Gundam Front charm on it).

I have a wig on in this, but just know my hair is ridiculous.
Right, so, I started playing back in November a little before finals week, and quickly realized that it was going to be slow playing for me if I played my usual way and talked to everyone, ever. Just getting through the intro was a little difficult for me, but I made it through. After which, through some miracle, I managed to determine (with the help of a kanji dictionary [oh by the way, it has furigana built in, which is super nice]) that I was now the mayor of NERV. I suddenly felt like I should have been a male named Gendo, but alas, I ended up as the super standard Animal Crossing character that they don't even show in demos.

One of the features I like in the new game is that you have the ability to stack fruits up to nine times, which means that you save so much time running into town and then up into the shopping area across the train tracks. The island you can go to for 1000 yen is also guaranteed to turn you a profit if you focus just on fishing up big fish or diving (yes, that's right, diving) for something like urchin or Nautilus. If you do this you can make a profit of about 100,000 bells at a time. Which is good because...

Aw man, what a shame...my axe broke...
The debt increases so astoundingly fast. It might have to do with the town I picked (you choose a town law at the beginning of the game that you can then change for 20,000 bells later on), but I'm onto paying off a third room which costs a whopping 498,000 bells. Again, with fishing and island fruit, its not that bad, but there are a great deal of places your bells could go. They can go to community projects like building a new bridge or a camp site, or to one of the many stores. If you really want to get things going, you can spend 10,000 bells and give 4 gold ore to the new refurbishing alpaca to make you a random piece of gold furniture. Ore? What is this black magic I speak of? Well, just like there was a money rock, there is now an additional random rock. Hit it with your shovel and you'll suddenly find yourself in possession of an ore (I've seen emerald, gold, and sapphire so far). As far as I know, no one has managed to figure out how to make a golden shovel in this game, and you don't really need one because your shovel is indestructible (but your axe, sadly, is not).

There are so many new characters too, that you never know who your neighbors will be. I ended up with two familiar faces and two residents that I want to leave, but they aren't getting the pitfall hints, as they've made it so that you can just walk around it to get into their house. Oh well...

Events are still around, and if anything you can always have a party somewhere in ACNL. Will I be buying it again when I return to America (hey, that's quarter two so it should be out, right?)? Yes. Absolutely.
Congratulations on the new year! Here's hoping this year is another great one!
For now, I hope you all have a brilliant and lucky year!
~AAO