The best Persona 4 comic ever

No seriously, these are JAWSOME.

Here are a few choice lines.

Youske: “Dude stop polishing those balls” Kou Ichijou “I can’t man, THESE BALLS ARE ON FIRE”

Yousuke: “I HAVE TO PEEEEEEEEEEEEE”

“You become friends with Yosuke. Yosuke will now DIE FOR YOU.”

NAOTOKAWAIIYONAOYO: “Did someone say GIRLS? Because I’m a boy. Just so you know.”

And my personal favorite:

Kanji Tatsumi: “Hi, I’m Kanji Tatsumi and I LOVE NAKED MEN.” Yousuke: D:

CHEGGITOUT. (Because Peachi is a jawsome dude/dudette)

Edit: WHAT HAVE I DONE A NEW BANNER IS HILARIOUSLY DISTURBING.

TH’ ENGINES! SHE CANNAE TAK’ IT ANYMOOR!

Hurrr

My sheer pride (and lazy Spine Primeval) screams out in pain to do this but… … …

I think I may need help.

One man may be able to do a lot of things, but as it is, I stink at periodic updates, gatecrashing drama parties and generally being a lazy git is going to invalidate me way before my use-by date.

…That’s it, I’m unleashing the beacon for help.

I’m looking for two categories of writers to help me out: A dedicated second bro or sis (I do not mean that in the familial term) for dedicated writing and guest writers.

DEDICATED WRITER

He (or she) must possess the following things/qualities:

• Must be able to write. No third-rate trolls. EVER.
• Must be able to commit to a very loose schedule.
• No, Tyrenol, as much as I’d love to have you on board, you have some issues with the fandom in general to be considered.
• Must actually have fun writing.
• While I’m not too keen on doing episodic blogging, I’m… … … open to the idea.
• Willing to do collab pieces from time to time.

The following are optional, but preferred.

• Female (I’m not sexist, seriously! You could be a friggen’ homosexual or a furry and I DON’T CARE.)
• Comes with hamsters. (Did I mention I looooooooove hamsters?)
• Able to draw is a massive plus.
• experience
• Actually has a sense of humour

GUEST WRITERS

Guest writers need to meet the following:

• Able to commit to a bi-monthly basis (hopefully)
• Is able to work under the worst leader ever (no seriously)
• Ability to choose a topic of your liking a plus.
• NO THIRD-RATE TROLLS. EVER.

I’m kinda ashamed to ask, but I am kinda looking to spice things up a bit.

Anyone who freakin’ cares had better comment here first. Then send your application to the following email:

drmchsr0 at gmail dot com

Oh yeah. I just remembered. Interested parties looking to fill either position have two choices for entries.

1. Anime nowadays lacks a certain “soul” or “spirit”. Do you agree? (Word limit: 1000)
2. Choose your own topic. Impress me. Has to be related to animation, Japanese culture, and/or your views on what makes anime interesting. (Word limit: 750)

HURR HURR HURR HURR.

AM I LATE TO MULTIBLOGGER PARTY? Y/N

Happy First Anniversary, Mogra!

No, really. Happy 1st anniversary. Because I’ll never get to do this until next year.

The WEB SIGHT.

The USTREAM CHANNEL.

ALSO THE FACEBOOK PAGE.

THE FAN CLUB FACEBOOK PAGE.

SATOSHI KON IS DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEADD

http://www.uk-anime.net/newsitem/Director_Satoshi_Kon_passes_away.html

Dude, he’s, like, fuckin’ stone cold dead. Six feet under, pushing daisies, joined the choir invisible.

He is an ex-director.

He will NOT get better, nor is he pining for the fjords. He’s fuckin’ dead, mang. Cancer got to him.

SATOSHI KON IS DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAD

(And now, back to my self-imposed silence, since summer doesn’t interest me all that much and until people I know start enjoying them animes and stop trying to be haters. Which is a poor opinion to be had, really, and shows that you can’t even move on. Childish opinion, really.)

Say, are you sick of C&Ds, drama, flamebaiting and general unpleasntness in VN translations?

Let us consider the current environment for VN translations today.

If you can finally get your butts off and find a group of people willing to agree to disagree and translate a game of your liking, and for some reason, you actually find some hosting that is not TLwiki, you have to face the hordes of Anonymous at 4han, demanding to know when the patch is out. On top of that, there’s the nasty attacks by other people, other groups… … …

And there’s of course the dreaded Berne Convention. Oh, but that’s just an excuse! Remember Rapelay That’s the reason why C&Ds are flying all over the place. Have I also mentioned that doing this is in direct violation of the Berne Convention and that you are at the mercy of your respective governments should they find out? Assuming you never asked permissions?

Starting to dislike the above situation? So do I.

Thankfully, a friend of mine has started a new… … … way of doing things. Find the guy, and ask him for permission to translate the game. Post the email that approves said translations, and BAM. It’s a legal work! Better still, you’ll be working with like-minded people,  learning the tricks of the trade while you’re at it!

Sounds too good to be true? It isn’t!

Welcome to the launch of Proper Permissions and it’s first project: Project t0rama. Yes, there’s a joke in there somewhere.

Yes, you read that right. Proper Permissions! To translate stuff! And to keep asses covered! Honeypots notwithstanding.

“I won’t die that easily! This is anime!”

Oh snap today is August 6.

Oh snap the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on this day.

OH SNAP.

ICBM TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

OH SNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNAP

The funny thing is, anime blogging isn’t fun anymore. Too many haters, trolls and the worst kind of people doing it rather than people letting loose and doing random stuff like this. Except kur0. Probably.

DIS CLAIMER GLOWS WITH AN AWESOME POWER: In no way am I trivializing the use of atomics on Japan during World War 2. That was an extremely tragic event that no one could have stopped. But it’s been 50-odd years and I like to see things a little humorously where possible. Also Dis Claimers should be huge and readable.

Are We Really Seeing The Death Of Anime And Manga?

Not too long ago, someone I knew remarked on Facebook, “The recent clamp down on manga scanlations will cause a drastic plummet in manga and anime product sales.” It’s a disturbing thought for a fan to be espousing, all things considered.

This dovetailed nicely with Dai Sato’s interview regarding the lack of appreciation of the animated medium to be able to tell a story, and the apparent lack of the viewers’ ability to read the stories and the meanings in shows like, in his words, “Eureka 7” and “Ergo Proxy”. (To be honest here, while I’ve heard great things about both, Ergo Proxy turned me off by how obviously pretentious it was.)

This would of course seem very, very shocking to the average fan, and even for older fans, who seem to be unable to come to terms with the changes anime has made over the years. Shows that had a great story to tell and were entertaining made way for light and fluffy slice-of-life shows that involve young, nubile, doe-eyed women doing nothing at all.

And to the older fan, it’s not just scary, it flies in their faces. This isn’t anime they came to love as a child! (Then again, most of the probably never saw “Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko”, which involved nubile young girls… … … ride in advanced starships blasting the crap out of other people. Same difference. I don’t think there was any immediate discernable plot.)

So how did the industry dig itself into a hole they seemingly could not get out of? Why the need to clamp down on online manga sites? What’s with the “moe” phenomenon?

It’s the Economy, stupid!

One giant elephant in the room supporters and detractors have not even deigned to notice or even mention is the state of the economy in Japan.

If you haven’t noticed, “Cool Japan” is being crushed by being 20-odd years in RECESSION. That’s right, Japan’s economy has been tanking like Gonzo’s bloody stock price! Japan’s economy shat bricks, had an aneurysm, and died! And then became a rotting zombie as far as I’m concerned! It didn’t recover save for a few false starts! And it’s still rotting away, it seems! The otaku industry is THE anomaly in the whole mess! Growing at unbelievable speeds, it laughed at the recession as if it was a bad dream! Well, Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, and Dick Cheney took care of THAT by almost causing the global economy to DIE from toxic assets!

But why then did the industry laugh off “The lost decade”? Well, it’s because of…

FUCKING FANSUBS, FUCKING FUNI AND YOU!

Hands up, those of you who have downloaded at least one series a year. So many hands? Wow, I never would have guessed.

The industry (and fansub/scanlation detractors) love to lampoon the Internet, high-speed broadband, powerful computers and the “entitlement generation” for causing the steady decline of anime in general (and I suspect manga), but of course, like most things, there’s ANOTHER giant elephant in the room both sides do not want to even look at, much less talk about.

Their insatiable appetite for all thing otaku and probably Japan. Back in 2000 and probably earlier, when Japan was only beginning to realize the untapped economic potential of licensing shows to the West, shows weren’t been churned out like, let’s say, canned meat. Shinbo could go out there and actually BE crazy, putting nubile girls in advanced spaceships blowing the crap out of other people in similarly-advanced spaceships (and get away with the violent equivalent of K-On, so to speak.) A time where if you had the numbers to back you up, you got a show lovingly crafted (Well, it seemed to me). A time where you had enough money to actually make 40-odd episodes and still have a bit left over. A time where Monster could have been extremely popular, so to speak. Where Tomino and Kawamori could dick around and make fun shows. Where even Hideaki Anno could get away with using anime as a wagon to scream how much he hated the world, the industry and himself. (What? It’s all true, I swear!) A time where the mangaka of HunterXHunter could get away with not drawing for months at an end.

And then technology brought anime and manga kicking and screaming to the global audience. High speed Internet connections, faster and cheaper computers, the invention of Bittorrent and a seeming lack of copyright enforcement created a movement to promote anime (albeit illegally) to the world at large. So pouplar was this movement, some of the criminals formed the companies we know today to bring in the shows the people wanted. And Japan saw the big money to be made, and responded in kind. It didn’t stop there, though. Faster connections also meant more people wanted to see this newfangled thing better than Disney, and those that had seen it wanted MORE. And this little monster called Greed grew bigger and bigger until we have our sad situation today.

While I’d love to point the loaded gun at me, blow myself away and be done with it, I’m not squarely to blame for the sad turn of events. There’s also been a…

Massive Demographic Shift

We tend to, or rather, we choose to, forget that the market for anime and manga has always been Japan-oriented. The Japanese, if they could so choose, have the ability to simply stop licensing shows to the world (but they would not get the money to prop up their flawed industry!) and simply survive on the domestic market.

And to be honest, there’s been a big change in what the Japanese want for, let’s say, at least a decade. Barring a few big names, people don’t want to see giant robots battling for courage, hope and peace anymore. The world has become a much scarier place, especially for Japan and the otaku, and most of them  are probably in their late 20s or early 30s by now. At this point, they don’t want to see any more shows that feature men screaming attack names out in their steel golem rides and overcome overwhelming odds, REALITY DOESN’T FUCKING WORK LIKE THAT. Remember that not even the combined efforts of Guy Shishioh, Domon Kasshu and Nekki Basara could ever hope to set the Japanese economy right again.

What does Japan do when faced with overwhelming odds she can’t even handle? That’s right, she WITHDRAWS. And the otaku are sterling examples of that. And what’s the tool for enticing them to stay in their shells, never to come out again? (And make a lot of money at the same time?) That’s right, the girls of K-On. (And Nayuki. And Mai. And Misuzu. And Tomoyo. And Kudo, And pretty much every “moe” girl out there.)

It may not be apparent to the entitlement generation, the older fans, and pretty much everyone I know in general, but the prevalent attitude in Japan has changed, and it’s not a very nice change.

While we’re all wailing on one another, determined to see one side die a most horrible death (probably fueled with atomics, I presume), we refuse to see the sad reality in Japan. Japan is in RECESSION. It’s people are DESPONDENT. Getting a JOB is almost downright IMPOSSIBLE. They don’t TRUST their GOVERNMENT to FIX THINGS, and most of them probably believe that THEY were the ones who CAUSED the PROBLEMS in the first place. And Western sentiments are not exactly positive, considering Rapelay, Kodomo no Jikan and Chris Handley are how Japan perceives the reaction of their exported goods.

If you ask me, the rise of maid cafes, rent-a-cat places, the apparent popularity of visual novels in Japan, and the ever-growing shut-in problem are not just mere coincidences. They are symptoms of a much larger problem. One that, unless we actually put aside our differences and actually SEE how serious the whole thing is, would actually lead to a real death of anime, manga, and even otaku culture worldwide, and I don’t mean MOGRA shutting down it’s live stream!

So What Can We Do?

First of all, industry and community has got to stop fighting! Fucking hell, we’re on the same team! Why are we tearing ourselves to pieces when we can actually HELP. Read up on Japan’s woes, listen to Patrick Macias talk about otaku culture, heck, let’s get Chris Handley off the fucking child sex offenders list (HE’S NOT EVEN SUPPOSED TO BE CHARGED, LET ALONE BE THERE) and shut down Sankaku Complex FOR GOOD. Information and action are our two best weapons against the threat of anime and manga dying a slow, horrible death, and there’s no thick steel body armor protecting it from the acids of the Sarlacc it’s in!

Secondly, campaign for a change of the Berne Convention! It’s more than just anime and manga at stake here! It’s the entire creative industry, and that includes what we love! Promote Steam, OpenManga and positive initiatives that serve the interests of the creator, not the companies exploiting the creators! [citation necessary] Campaign for a change in working conditions for animators as well, while we’re at it!

Thirdly, when all else fails, actually try to buy at least 10% of what you downloaded! As much as this is alien and probably loathsome to the entitlement generation, this is still your basic means to say something. Your wallet determines the next license they want to get. Don’t waste your economic power. Unless you happen to like K-On and it’s ilk, then… … … I don’t know what to say.

So what happens after this?

I dunno, man. The industry has been hurtling to it’s eventual doom for quite a while already. I’ll admit it’s going to be a tough fight to get the train to switch gears, but if we don’t do something, we might as well plead guilty and hope not to drop the soap. Or find something new to do.

Otherwise, we gotta do something, or risk seeing our favorite form of entertainment die that slow, horrible death it probably deserved. No one ever said this was easy, mind.

A Hamster Public Service Announcement – Yes, Japanese Women might feel a bit overwhelmed by 2D Females, most of them avoid the creeps who like them

Yes, everyone has probably heard about HOW JAPANESE WOMEN MIGHT FEEL INADEQUATE TO THEIR 2-DIMENSIONAL COUNTERPARTS. It’s a bit too bloody obvious since 2D females were made by males (mostly), for males. And by males, I mean the otaku.

You can’t exactly beat the likes of Kyou and Kudo, especially when they’re tailor-made to appeal to… … … whatever the heck they’re supposed to appeal. (Other than you-know-where)

But yeah, fact is, GUESS WHERE THE GROUNDBREAKING NEWS CAME FROM?

OH EMM GEE, source tracking lists SANKAKU COMPLEX [all sankaku links are nsfw, people] for the SOURCE.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX. 

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

FUCKING SANKAKU COMPLEX.

IT’S A FUCKING SANKAKU ARTICLE, PEOPLE. YOU FUCKING KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS.

You all had better read Matt Alt and get your facts straight.

HuffPo Article…

…Via Geekomatic

…Via Kotaku

…Via Sankaku…

from the original article at Livedoor.

Of course, that means most Japanese females are actively repulsed (if not outright hate, and would scourge Japan with high-powered weaponry and flamethrowers if given the chance) by the mere notion of guys falling in love with 2D females. Yes, they know that they might be unable to tear guys away from their computers, fake women and dakis, but they also hate that idea, and most of them actively avoid (and would beat up, again, if allowed) any guy who professes their love for 2D females.

But where was I? Oh yeah.

Stop reading Sankaku Complex, people. The porn’s not worth the yellow journalism, and for fuck’s sake, you can get porn ANYWHERE ON THE INTERNET..

Do I watch Amagami for the plot?

No I don’t. I watch Amagami for the Itou Shizuka eargasm only she can bring.

Yes the show is trite, and the guy is a spineless dipshit, BUT ITOU SHIZUKA GIVES ME AN EARGASM. Also, CATS.

Also, chaostangent is a silly little man. A very silly little baby of a man.

minori gets bullied, and a bit more.

I’m not too sure what I’m doing anymore, to be honest.

The community’s gone to shit (not all that surprising, to be honest) even though there are cool dudes in it,.

And then I get the news that minori (blocks websites to foreign fans because they ARE xenophobic douchebags) is practically begging NNL (BREAK THE SUPPORT DISC, etc) to stop distributing their works.

Apparently it would appear that NNL’s previous experience with such incidents (more like Gipface et al giving minori the finger due to LOL DIFFERENT COUNTRIES) has forced minori into doing this so-called face-saving gesture.

…There’s also an announcement happening on the 21st of July. I can’t say that this fills me with a lot of positive emotions. It’s either NNL getting to work on and distribute minori’s products overseas (a prospect that fills me with dread) or it’s going to be the finger again.

There’s no good that can come out of this deal, to be honest, and well, what can I say or do to change the situation? Most I can do is to tell people about it and hope they make the right decision and boycott the unholy union if it ever happens.

Oh well, it could be worse. It could have been Moogy.

And then Go Nagai saw what Imagawa did, and he was pleased. So pleased, he ANNOUNCED A NEW MAZINGER ANIME.

HOLY SHIT THERE’S A NEW MAZINGER ANIME

It’s not Shin Mazinkaizer, BUT WHO CARES.

Also, HURR SOURCE.

You are now imagining Sachi trying to, uh, do something. MANUALLY.

WHAT HAS SCIENCE HAVE I DONE D:

Why am I playing Sharin No Kuni after so long

Why am I Chapter 2

Why am I staring at THE TERRIBLE SEXYTIME OF THE SOUL D:

Why is Sachi so moe D:

Why isn’t it animated D:

Why is the Main Character such a manipulative weaksauce M piece of crap asshole

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

(Translation: I am playing Sharin no Kuni, and I am enjoying myself immensely. Until I had to make a choice at the Hscene. And then my tenous grip on reality snapped. Like a twig.)