Update: I wasn't expecting that (ep 6) but truthfully, it's the only thing in the show so far that survives the refrigerator test. Of course there'd be something like that.
Update: Odd little show, very uneven, but worth a look. What is with that clock, though?
Update: Only two episodes left to go? That might work out just right.
Update: I haven't found the original that they modeled the clock on, but:
Yeah, it's real. Yeesh, the places people choose to live.
1
Are you watching anything else this season? I have been watching Durara!!, Katanagatari (coming out monthly, each episode is 50 minutes), and a couple of others.
Posted by: Penfold at Thursday, March 11 2010 07:26 AM (1PeEC)
2
So far just Sora no Woto, Hanamaru Kindergarten, and Hidamari Sketch. Oh, and Kimi ni Todoke, continued from last season.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thursday, March 11 2010 10:54 AM (PiXy!)
3
I am watching Kimi ni Todoke as well, I like it, a bit slow paced (which I think is intended), but it is no Toradora! Haven't watched Hanamaru Kindergarten or Hidamari Sketch.
Posted by: Penfold at Friday, March 12 2010 03:03 AM (1PeEC)
4Hanamaru Kindergarten is a nice show; not amazing, but worth a look..
Hidamari Sketch, though, is just wonderful, all three seasons of it. Very highly recommended.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Friday, March 12 2010 09:22 AM (PiXy!)
Update: One of the great things about being caught up with Kimi ni Todoke is that I can also catch up on That's absurdly awesome episode-by-episode reviews. DO NOT READ BEFORE WATCHING RELEVANT EPISODES. If you have watched relevant episodes, start here. If you have not watched relevant episodes, watch relevant episodes, then start
here. The fact that they refer to SPOILER as Vichy-tan is perfection.
1
KnT is pretty amazing, but I gave up on it after about 10 episodes. Dunno why.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Sunday, March 07 2010 05:23 PM (/ppBw)
2
That's just where I got stuck at first too. The story gets bogged down for a couple of episodes around ep 9/10. But things pick up again just after that.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sunday, March 07 2010 06:29 PM (PiXy!)
3
I'm following spoilers at Sea Slugs, which seems better than the real thing.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Monday, March 08 2010 04:11 AM (/ppBw)
4
I took a look at the Sea Slugs reviews and didn't think much of them - and I usually like Sea Slugs. That's reviews, on the other hand, are a work of art.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Monday, March 08 2010 09:06 AM (PiXy!)
1
Now that I knew GA, Hidamari just does not measure up. Yet it goes for the 3rd season. Remember J.Greely on DearS vs Girls Bravo?
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Sunday, February 21 2010 05:27 AM (/ppBw)
2
Here's the thing, Pete: most people, and apparently most viewers, don't agree with you. Sorry to be blunt about it, but HidaSketch is much more popular because it's a better show than GA. Better characters, better humor, better animation, better writing, better story, better design... but, to be fair, GA does teach you more about art.
Oh, and Sketchbook is better than GA, too. But, hey, keep protesting, man... fight the power and all that.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Sunday, February 21 2010 06:36 AM (tm3b1)
3
I bounced off GA, so I can't give an informed opinion other than it didn't catch my attention. But Hidamari is simply a wonderful show. I wasn't sure that they could carry that forward for a third season, but so far it has all the charm of the first two.
As for DearS and Girls Bravo, both of them are terrible.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sunday, February 21 2010 12:33 PM (PiXy!)
I know that this is off topic, but my blog has somehow exceeded its bandwidth. Yeah, I know: with such a robust readership, it should happen more frequently. In any event, let me know what I can do to help resolve the situation.
Thanks.
Posted by: physics geek at Thursday, January 28 2010 05:04 AM (MT22W)
6
Almost certainly due to people hotlinking you. I'll take a look at that, but in the meantime I've increased your bandwidth so you're back on the air.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thursday, January 28 2010 01:25 PM (PiXy!)
Went out shopping today, found zero copies of Ponyo on the shelves.* There was a gap in the P's at JB Hifi, though.
I did find volumes 5-8 of the Midori no Hibi manga, so I snaffled those. (I already had 1-4, then it went out of print. Looks like it's been reprinted, yay!)
And picked up a few things on the Steam sale:
Braid
2.49 USD
World of Goo
4.99 USD
Indigo Prophecy
3.39 USD
Audiosurf
2.50 USD
Rome: Total War Gold
2.49 USD
Beyond Good and Evil
4.99 USD
Prince of Persia: Sands of Time
4.99 USD
Subtotal
25.84 USD
Lumines Base + Advance Pack
2.99 USD
Evil Genius
1.99 USD
Assassin's Creed
9.99 USD
STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl (AU)
1.49 USD
Space Trader
1.99 USD
Heroes of Might and Magic 5
4.99 USD
Subtotal
23.44 USD
Some of those (Space Trader in particular) didn't get great reviews, and others (Prince of Persia, Beyond Good and Evil) are a few years old, but when you are paying as little as $1.49 a game, it can't hurt to take a few chances.
Update: Poop. Wasted $5 buying the Heroes of Might and Magic 5 pack just now, instead of just getting the expansions as I'd intended. I realised about half a second after I clicked Confirm. I will now go and kill something virtual to make myself feel better.
Take your standard high school teen romance angst-fest... And attach a JATO unit and smash it into the side of a cliff at 600MPH where it explodes into a shower of rainbow-coloured sakura petals.
This one is actually good. Double bonus points for teenagers who aren't all jerks and/or idiots by default.
Update: Okay, so Sawako's pretty much a poster-girl for
Asperger's
but the show carries if off with such grace and charm that it... Um... Comes out charming and graceful.
Update: Oh, and some really gorgeous artwork.
This is also a 12-episode series, but unlike Nyan Koi, I think I'm going to miss it when it's over.
it's a fairly mild case. Nodame on the other hand...
Posted by: Jonathan Tappan at Sunday, November 15 2009 12:32 PM (7wFYN)
3
I haven't watched Nodame. But the way Sawako treats
social interaction
as
an intellectual puzzle
rather than
an instinctive response
is typical, perhaps even
diagnostic
of
Asperger's
.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sunday, November 15 2009 02:11 PM (PiXy!)
4
You cannot be serious about Nodame. She's quite well adjusted, considering her peers (just look at freaks like Yuuto and Masumi-chan), just washes with the same frequency my daughter does.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Sunday, November 15 2009 03:37 PM (/ppBw)
5
I just think that a term intended for a rather serious disability is starting to be used to describe something for which a better term, like "nerdiness", might be appropriate.
As for Nodame, her picture belongs in the next edition of the DSM, right next to the official description of the syndrome.
Posted by: Jonathan Tappan at Tuesday, November 17 2009 11:32 AM (7wFYN)
6
While I agree with you, I still think that Sawako pretty much exemplifies this. Particularly with what we see in episode 6.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Tuesday, November 17 2009 11:59 AM (PiXy!)
This is actually enjoyable. Not ground-breaking, but fun. The incipient harem is countered by the fact that our hero knows who he likes, and so do most of the girls. And the cats are, well, cats.
It's only a 12 episode series, which is a good thing - the premise couldn't sustain much more (or at least, not without more inventive writing than we've seen so far). Will keep watching this one.
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Friday, November 13
Sora No Otoshimono
Meh.
You seen one flock of rocket-propelled panties overtaking an SR-71 Blackbird, you seen them all.
Posted by: nf at Sunday, October 18 2009 06:45 PM (EBWDb)
2
Papa Pixy, I'm afraid The Pond has been slammed with spam over the past 12 hours or so, all of it u*g-related. Not as interesting as yours though... I rather like the one that copies a random comment.
Can we just completely ban the word "ugg"?
Posted by: Wonderduck at Sunday, October 25 2009 02:20 AM (4Mcos)
3
I've raised the ugg-ding level from 2 to 5. That means that a single mention of the word by an unregistered commenter will get the comment flagged as probable spam, two will reject the comment, and three will automatically ban that IP.
Let's see how that goes.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sunday, October 25 2009 12:15 PM (PiXy!)
4
In the middle of this spamuggattack, something... odd... has occurred to my comments. The retrospective comment sidebar has taken to showing comments from June, and if I go into the editor and look at my comments, things are all argbargly.
You're welcome to pop in and take a look, to see what I mean.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Sunday, October 25 2009 01:07 PM (4Mcos)
5
That shouldn't happen, but I do have a program that fixes it up. I'll run that now.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sunday, October 25 2009 01:49 PM (PiXy!)
The most recent spammer, that you just got hit by (Tiffany Jewelry) also spammed me. Which is interesting, because I require registration to make comments.
I've added that guy to my ban list. Also, my "recent comments" is all fouled up now.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Friday, October 30 2009 01:29 AM (+rSRq)
9
Actually, I haven't, because I can't figure out how.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Friday, October 30 2009 01:32 AM (+rSRq)
Pixy, I can't ban this guy because I can't figure out what to add to the ban list. (He just left three on Chizumatic.) He's logging in, and of course to register had had to have a site here. But once he's logged in, he isn't using either his site or his login name when he posts his crap.
So I can't figure out what to add to the ban list to get rid of him.
In my "comments" listing, I see the posting date, the text he posted, and I see the name he used in the comment, and the URL he used, and whatever email address he entered. But I don't see his real meenu identity and I don't know of any way for me to find it out. The "comments" listing needs another column which contains the login ID of the user, if any.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Monday, November 02 2009 04:14 PM (+rSRq)
15
I was thinking about this more. There isn't any room for a new column in that listing. What about a way to click a link on a particular comment and bring up an extended listing of just that one with more information, such as the true login of the commenter (if any)?
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Monday, November 02 2009 04:42 PM (+rSRq)
16
This guy just doesn't give up, does he? I wonder if we can bribe him to go hassle someone else.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Saturday, November 07 2009 05:23 PM (+rSRq)
17
I read an article on the economics of spam recently. It's big business - multiple billions of dollars a year.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Thursday, November 12 2009 11:56 PM (PiXy!)
18
Economics may be unfortunate, but we still need to ban by login.
Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Saturday, November 14 2009 07:21 AM (/ppBw)
We can do that now. Problem is, there isn't any way to figure out what login to ban.
I got spammed again yesterday morning. I happened to notice it while it was happening, and deleted the spams within minutes. But I couldn't ban the spammer because I don't know what login they used.
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Saturday, November 14 2009 10:05 AM (+rSRq)
20
Yep, I'm setting up a quick-and-easy banning function right now. Ban URLs, IPs and users in one click. Well, three clicks.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Saturday, November 14 2009 10:53 AM (PiXy!)
It's definitely one of those can't-look-away things. After a two-volume flash-forward, we go back to watch our hero, Guts (yes, really) grow up. From his humble beginnings as a battlefield orphan born during what TVTropes aptly terms the Dung Ages, Guts works his way up to lieutenant of a successful mercenary company before everything goes - quite literally - to hell.
Manga is the perfect medium for this story. In the hands of any less than the most brilliant of authors, as a purely written work it would lose much of its impact.* And as live action film or television, it would be unwatchably horrifying.
There's an anime of it, which covers the first part of the flash-forward and then what's known as the Golden Age arc. This did and didn't make sense to me at first. On the one hand, the Golden Age arc - the flashback to Guts growing up and the adventures of the aforementioned mercenary company - are certainly the least disturbing part of the story, and the best suited for animation... Up until the end of the arc, which is possibly the most disturbing part of the story.
So either they left out the real ending of that arc - and there's no other sensible place to end it - or they animated something really horrifying.
Oh, who am I fooling. This is Japan. Here are the descriptions of the last three episodes, with spoilers removed: (Warning: Squicky stuff after the jump.) more...
1
I followed the TV Tropes link. Darn you! I want my evening back! ;p
Posted by: Avatar_exADV at Tuesday, September 15 2009 06:10 PM (vGfoR)
2
Well, the mangaka just announced thru a recent chapter that the anime has been canceled.
I find the series interesting. It has come a long way (passing thru what I think are 3 different drawing styles) since 1989 and the arrange of the plot was very good, I think. You begin low (already a mess, after Griffith-god) then begin hiking slowly (crappy childhood until joining the Hawks) and keep slowly going up (back to messed-up Guts trying to redeem himself). Until now where they threw Griffith into full mode Japanese surrealism (yuck).
Posted by: Jaked at Friday, October 30 2009 08:04 AM (X1Mwy)
Brigadoon, Or, Marin And The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
Our heroine doesn't exactly have an easy time of it in this one.* Though she does get a sweet set of wheels at one point.
Marin's voiced by Kaori, and I could swear that I've heard that ahaaa before, but not in any of the shows listed there.
Also, Lolo is a heckuvalot like Guu.
Highly recommended.
Warning: May** contain traces*** of comedy, tragedy, drama, giant robots, parallel dimensions, Tokyo Tower, giant lolis, mecha-turtles, crazed inventors, psychopathic killers, Richard Nixon, magical girl transformation sequences, Apollo 11, graphic violence, Shinto shrines, the end of the world as we know it, the Osaka World Expo, cat-rabbit-elves, warped daydreams, and full-frontal nudity.
*
No, seriously, SPOILER!
She gets beaten up, blown up, dropped from great heights, shot, stabbed, tortured, (re-)orphaned, blinded, abandoned, her house burned to the ground, stabbed again, and, at the last, since this series does nothing by halves, killed.
"In any group of four or more cute girls, one of them must be a
meganeko. It is required. One hyperactive, one ditz, one practical, and
one shy meganeko. It's like quarks."
Naked Naughty Admiral Chicks 'R' Us Part Twelve: Return Of The Revenge Of The Catgirls
Last time I asked for recommendations for recent moeblob shows, and ended up watching Gurren Lagann, which was awesome.
And also Hidamari Sketch (both seasons), which was also awesome, and definitely moeblob material.
So this time I'm looking for an (awesome) action series, with lots of running about and fighting and things blowing up. And I've already seen Black Lagoon.
Oh, the title? Well, Firefrog remembers things you've typed into form fields, and when I started typing "New Recommendation Request", as soon as I hit "n" the first part of that title came up. (SFW, alas.)
Update: I was going to watch Sketchbook Full Color Apostrophes, but apparently I already did. Huh. My mind must be going, because I'd completely forgotten that.
Chrome Shelled Regios or Rideback from recently. El Cazador de la Bruja from a little while back.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Sunday, July 19 2009 08:37 AM (8kQ8M)
2
Dragon Ball Kai has been going surprisingly well. They're doing a very nice job of cutting out the fat. 15 eps out now, and the Saiyajin arc is almost over. (One more ep, I figure.)
Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Sunday, July 19 2009 08:45 AM (+rSRq)
3
I watched a little of Rideback and pfui. Regios I liked better. El Cazador de la Bruja wasn't bad, what I saw of it. And that reminds me, I could go back and finish Michiko to Hatchin, which was also pretty good.
Dragonball Kai... Hmm.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Sunday, July 19 2009 11:39 AM (PiXy!)
4
Oh, one more for the Moeblob pile: Bamboo Blade. It isn't, not really, but it has some blobbish moments.
Another action show, running right now, would be Canaan. It's looking a lot like another Noir, but with blood and no Reis.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Sunday, July 19 2009 12:36 PM (ZpwKm)
This is what you get when you take a hentai dating simulation, remove most of the hentai, and then use the NO! WRONG! ending.
All the girls are insane, except the one who is crazy. The hero - such as he is - is pretty much the only sane person in sight, and he has the brains of a cheeseburger - or, I suppose, the hormones of a teenager - or he'd run for his life.
Really not recommended. If you want tsundere romangst, try the far superior Toradora or Shana. Or even Zero no Tsukaima. It's all the same character (and the same voice actress) anyway.
1
Yeah, Akane iro really blew chunks. And there wasn't any fan service.
Posted by: atomic_fungus at Monday, July 06 2009 06:35 AM (M2zC/)
2
Oh great and mighty Pixy. I have an interesting security issue. Please check your mail. Oh....and wise...did I mention wise?...and kind....and benevolent....
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Monday, July 06 2009 10:27 AM (V5zw/)
3
Got your email. I'll get that sorted out for you ASAP.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Monday, July 06 2009 01:00 PM (PiXy!)
4
Apparently the Akane-iro OVA has all the fanservice that's missing from the series - and then some. Haven't set it yet though.
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Monday, July 06 2009 05:58 PM (PiXy!)
5
Hm. I liked it, m'self. Oh, it wasn't high art (more like high fred, art's stupider brother), but it hit just the right notes for me.
Posted by: Wonderduck at Tuesday, July 07 2009 11:29 AM (8kQ8M)
Posted by: Wonderduck at Thursday, July 09 2009 02:26 PM (AnJdu)
8
Pixy, something really weird is happening over at The Pond. It appears to have wandered into the Wayback Machine, my top post is now from October 3rd, 2007. The page layout is from then as well... help?
Posted by: Wonderduck at Friday, July 10 2009 02:44 PM (AnJdu)
9
...and now it's back to being correct again. Server Burp?
Posted by: Wonderduck at Friday, July 10 2009 03:05 PM (AnJdu)
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Friday, July 10 2009 08:06 PM (PiXy!)
11
Server says nup nup nup, haven't had so much as a slow query in the past three days.
Very peculiar... Hmm.
Aha!
Was it showing your old Movable Type site? We had a slight glitch today while moving DNS servers. Only lasted a couple of minutes, but if you picked up the wrong IP address during that time, it would show exactly that - and stick that way for up to four hours. (Only for you - everyone else would see your new site.)
Posted by: Pixy Misa at Friday, July 10 2009 08:12 PM (PiXy!)
12
Yep, that's exactly what I was looking at. Thanks for clearing that up for me, Pixy!!!
Posted by: Wonderduck at Friday, July 10 2009 10:40 PM (AnJdu)
