These are my quick impressions of the game, admittedly a little influenced by a quick glance at the reviews.

First of all, all the good things from every BioWare game are here in full force.  Not that much expansion necessary.  Pretty graphics, awesome story (so far), great characters and production values.

From a basic standpoint the various game systems are good.  I can't say great because I definitely have found some stuff that irks me.  First, it'd be nice to have a little more guidance in finding things, as in points of interest or quest destinations.  The map is a letdown in that sense.  Moreover, the journal systems of other games (even Mass Effect) are less convoluted in structure and make these sorts of things more straightforward.

Second is something I expect is going to pop up as an annoyance across the board.  Party members not under direct control are controlled by a series of conditionals.  In situation x, do y.  This is the same as the FFXII gambit system except you don't need to unlock behaviors, only slots.  However they require way too much tweaking to get right, and honestly it's hard to see that your characters are doing anything you want them to.  You end up having to do a lot of stop and go micro management.  The opposite to this is FFXII where you could mostly let your party members act independently without excessive worry.

Last, this makes it way too hard to play a mage.  Since you can't expect your characters to control enemies in any sort of organized fashion it becomes really hard to use your spells to full effect.  Why is this?  Friendly fire.  I'm sorry, but the friendly fire is excessive and unnecessary.  It should either not be there or a toggle should be available in every difficulty.  I can't use my CC if my party is in the thick of it, because they all get caught- same for AoE.

To be honest I think this can all be addressed.  I'll wait and see what BioWare does from this point on.  Some better tactics presets, a little work on party AI alone would go a long way towards making things more fun.

Anyway, that's all a bit harsh.  I played the damn game for 5 hours straight without noticing.  I know it's a sad thing to say about games these days, but publishers rush developers (even on delayed games) and so I still think this is a great game, and figure a lot of what's wrong will be fixed.  I do in fact recommend this game- of course I'd say PC is best.

PHILLIES TO THE WORLD SERIES AGAIN!  SUCK IT NY! SUCK IT ANAHEIM! LIGHTS OUT DODGERS!

So I've had these images for a while, and it just occurred to me that some of them would make for awesome Otakon costumes.  Anyone have opinions?  Here are some of the ones I'm considering....

I put them behind a cut so you can ignore this post.  The top 5 are my top 5 choices.  Skarmory and Scyther would be awesome but very difficult.  Obviously Registeel would take some adaptation.  I have a folder full at http://rukia.rirnef.net/Gijinka

( Costume Pics )

If Darkrai often dozes off, does it give itself nightmares?

First I want to make something clear. ギン is a loser. ギン is the worst.  ギンが嫌いです。

Anyway, I'm in despair.  There is only one TV episode of Bakemonogatari left.  Also, ZSZS will be over soon.  Last, I'm bored even though there are plenty of things to do.  I just can't decide what to do.

Oh hey, will someone make me a Bakemonogatari layout for this thing?

New episode of Bakemonogatari today.  I mean, watched.  Anyway, I really enjoyed it, but I'm praying this voice only stuff will be fixed on the DVDs (or preferably Bluray).  I know there are people who hate SHAFT just for the sake of hating it.  None the less, I believe this show deserves a proper treatment, and hopefully they'll have the budget (given they certainly have the time) to take care of it.

In other news, I "worked" today by sitting at a table in the shade on an absolutely beautiful day chatting with the two managers at my store and a tech.  It was community day and we were giving out random stuff.  Actually what we did mostly was find food and sit in beach chairs.  After that I sat around and did nothing.  Aside from watching Bakemonogatari I watched Eva and drank rum and coke.  The rum is one I haven't had before, Spiced Jack No. 94.  The 94 is because it is 94 proof.  It's good.  It's certainly different than Captain Morgan (which is the only rum I really drink, other than a few shots of Bacardi) but it goes well with Coke.  I hadn't watched Eva in quite a while, and the last few weeks have been so insane I just needed to sit down and relax.  Eva is basically entertaining up until the last two episodes, although you can see how they start to run out of budget before that.  I do prefer the resolution of the last two over EoE, but it would be nice if they were actually... animated.  I'm interested to see how the new movies will conclude.

Even though I understand, it's difficult not to repeat the same mistake.

In the continuing saga of me loving this show... the latest episode was awesome.  So were the 6 episodes before that.  I think I already said that the art is just amazing.. and well yeah.  It's staying that way.  I highly encourage everyone to check it out.

In other news, I've been confounded for the past week with my inability to find my DS.  This led to me spending the last four or so hours cleaning and organizing obsessively as I occasionally do in hopes of finding it.  That proved fruitless, but at least I got something done.
 Anyway I ended up finding it in the most annoying place it could have been, but I'm most pleased to have it back.

Rules:
01. Anyone who looks at this entry has to post this meme and their current wallpaper at their LiveJournal.
02. Explain in five sentences why you're using that wallpaper!
03. Don't change your wallpaper before doing this! The point is to see what you had on!

Image behind cut because it's rather large even at 50%
( Desktop )

I think this image speaks for itself.  SMT is awesome. Jack Frost is awesome. That is all.

Namely a power supply, a graphics card and a CPU.

Antec Neopower 550 W Modular power supply

BFG Tech GeForce 8800 GTS 320 MB RAM

Intel Core2 Duo 6300 (1.86 GHz per core)

The processor is socket LGA775, and it's one of the first generation of Core2 processors.   The graphics card will require a PCI express slot. These all run just fine on the specified power supply, but the power supply is not enough to run the higher end of current graphics cards, though it will handle most of the Core2 line of processors.  If anyone is interested name a price as I am probably going to be upgrading these in the near future.

As usual, disclaimer of erogame ads etc.  Please see here incredible cosplay.

http://www.sankakucomplex.com/2009/08/17/c76-comiket-cosplay-sexier-than-ever/

Tsundere (Harsh Outside-Gentle Inside)
[ ] You come off as sort of aloof to other people.
[ ] In public, you intentionally refrain from showing much weakness.
[ ] You have a secret obsession with something cute.
[ ] You pretend that you hate your crush even though you really love him/her.
[ ] You blush when people point out your sensitivities.
[ ] You blush when people tell sexual jokes.
Total: 0/6

Yandere (Gentle Outside-Harsh Inside)
[x] You’re very sweet and kind in public.
[ ] When romance becomes a topic of discussion, people say your personality changes drastically.
[ ] You know some sort of martial art, swordplay, or otherwise.
[ ] You have a crush who you’d literally kill for.
[ ] You have a pet-peeve that makes you snap.
[x] Major mood-swings?
Total: 2/ 6

Megane (Glasses Character)
[x] You have glasses.
[x] You can sometimes be clumsy, ditzy, or absent-minded.
[x] You are always very polite in your speech.
[x] You are fairly intelligent in some field.
[ ] You take discipline seriously.
[ ] You have some sort of fetish for something.
Total: 4/ 6

Tsukkomi (Angry Guy)
[ ] You have a friend who often makes silly or embarrassing remarks.
[ ] You smack/beat up this friend in some way.
[ ] You do your best to maintain a calm facade, only to be thwarted by this friend.
[ ] If you & your friend were a yin-yang, you’d be the “yang”.
[x] You swear a lot. (it depends on the situation. If I‘m really pissed off. Or hurt.)
[ ] You try to bring out the more serious side of your ridiculous friend.
Total: 1/ 6

Boke (Dumb Guy)
[x] You often make silly or embarrassing comments.
[x] You like annoying the heck out of your best friend.
[ ] You often get beaten up by your friend in some way, but you take it in good stride.
[ ] If you & your friend were a yin-yang, you’d be the “yin”.
[x] You are normally very laid back and carefree.
[ ] You try to bring out the happier side of your angry friend.
Total: 3/ 6

Nadeshiko (Perfect Wife)
[ ] You are always almost overly polite.
[x] You love traditional Japanese culture.
[ ] You often wear either a kimono, yukata, or apron.
[ ] You’re an excellent cook.
[ ] You are hardly ever angry.
[ ] You have really long hair.
Total: 1/ 6

Lolita/Shota Character
[ ] You like sweets or chocolate.
[ ] You adore cute things and/or the word “kawaii”.
[ ] You use Japanese suffixes like “-chan,” “-tan,” “-sempai,” etc...
[ ] You add unnecessary suffixes to the ends of your sentences, like “nyo,” “nyu,” “un,” etc...etc
[?] You are considered gullible or naive.
[ ] You have a tall/powerful friend who protects you.
?/6

Do you like MEGANE?

Being a Baccano! fan I think this is awesome, Hetalia fans (or both) will find it awesome also.

http://www.sankakucomplex.com/2009/08/09/hetalia-baccano-juuden-chan-parody-madness/

The site itself is plastered in NSFW ads and things.  Fair warning.  Also, if you ignore the NSFW stuff (or don't) there are a lot of hilarious and entertaining stories there.

Buy it for me.

While there have been some great shows lately (and usually there are every season), it really seems like things have reached a new low.  Granted, everyone knows that in every media the best sales will belong to titles that capitalize on simple emotions and pure entertainment value.  But honestly, K-ON! has just nearly smashed first day sales records of video releases with it's Blu-Ray edition in Japan.  A show that relies on NOTHING but moe appeal.

To summarize my feelings and paraphrase a few comments from the Sankaku Complex story, I have to say this is pathetic.  First, if this and subsequent releases maintain strong long term sales, it shows that the fanbase in Japan has dwindled to very little but moe otaku.  Second, even if they aren't moe otaku, the second option is that they will eat anything KyoAni shoves down their throats.  All this does is encourage KyoAni to brazenly pull the kind of shit they're doing with Haruhi now.

Anime is already struggling to escape it's stagnation as an entertainment medium and this can't lead to anything good.  It's simply going to lead studios to produce more of this niche moe bullshit, and it's going to backfire in the end.  I'm not saying that more shallow titles are bad, or that they aren't expected.  After all, nearly everyone appreciates guilty pleasures in one form or another.  But still, variety is a necessity in any genre.  I may like a lot of SF novels, but other people enjoy romance or mystery.  If mecha, endless fighting tournament (think Naruto) and comedy shows start to dwindle, it's not going to do any good.

Anyway my whole point is that I hate K-ON! and everything it represents.  I don't hate every moe show, but moe needs to be only one aspect- Lucky Star, Shana, Haruhi, and even romantic comedy shows like Toradora or Love Hina are far better.

So everyone is doing their report so I should do mine, right?

I think this will be a bit more terse than the others, because I actually didn't do a lot of things but had a lot of fun.

First off, a summary of changes.  The amount of store bought cosplays has skyrocketed.  Everywhere you turned there were D. Grey Man outfits and Akatsuki cloaks.  Also, there were an unbelievable amount of ravers.  The number of cosplays from Prince of Tennis and Ouran High School Host Club dropped off rather considerably.  People in entirely pointless adult store outfits (think vinyl and minimal skin coverage) was definitely up.  Lolitas were up, but more interesting was the fact that many of them were tasteful and well done.  Overall it was a strange trend of people just dressing up in outrageous things.  Oh, last thing I should mention is you could tell that people my age who started earlier in the con (10 or so years ago) were bringing young children- entirely inappropriate and very bad parenting given the attendees and risque attire.

Moving on from that are the things I did.  As usual, I went to the dealers room with very specific things in mind.  Unfortunately I was frustrated in most of my efforts and so I ended up spending too much money on stupid impulse buys.  I did pick up an excellent Haruhi art book and an amazing figure of Ryougi Shiki from Kara no Kyoukai.  I went to the Inoue Kikuko panel which was a lot of fun.  Toward the end it got annoying because it was an endless stream of people asking her to do various voices even though they couldn't come up with a line.  However I was satisified- one of the last things was me surprising her with a three part question regarding Zetsubou-sensei.

The other highlight was the revelation that she had an anime song cover band, and she asked for suggestions of songs to cover.  The other panel I went to was Bandai's night panel.  That was really fun as they started out serious then turned silly.  Yamakan (director of Lucky Star and Kannagi) made a surprise appearance and it was specifically requested that people ask him outrageous and silly questions.  It was very funny to see his reactions.  The other thing people were asked to do was make confessions (in the spirit of Kannagi).  Amazingly, someone confessed that they only watched fansubs.  It went silent for a moment and the panelists simultaneously dropped their jaws in synch.  After that they decided to be forgiving and said that normally they'd toss him out, but in the spirit of the panel they tossed him a t-shirt but warned him jokingly that security would seize him at the door.  At the end they had people attempt to do the dance from the Kannagi opening then bumrush the stage for hand outs.  I got a ridiculous Lucky Star t-shirt that I gave to my mother.  The last thing to note is that I got my Haruhi art book autographed by Yamakan.

Regarding cosplay, I wore my yukata (not technically cosplay) on Friday and my amazing White Mage costume on Saturday.  As some of my friends mentioned, the amount of interesting cosplay was down percentage wise, but those that were interesting were generally very well done.  Unfortunately my lack of foresight regarding my costumes combined with a camera that wasn't terribly cooperative prevented me from taking as many photos as I would have liked.

Over all it was great, and I did what I most enjoyed- hang out with the usual crew and have fun.

Kenz, I need your paypal! Message it to me on FB or something when you get the chance.

Please pardon spelling errors and annoying swaps of homonyms.  Somehow I'm becoming dyslexic.

Regarding Bakemonogatari, I just watched the second episode and I can definitely see this turning out very well.  The direction is top notch, the dialogue is great, and the story is engrossing.

So I told my buddy I'd plug this for him, and here goes.  My good friend Joecam is selling a ton of games.  I personally picked up Disgaea and PGR4 at very reasonable prices.  For a list head over here.  He's totally legit and there is probably something on there that you want.

Really impressed with this show.  I started it up and was really impressed with the visuals.  It has a very unique artistic style, as well as direction.  After about a minute in I figured it had to be SHAFT from the angles, and I turned out to be right.  But this goes well beyond everything they've done before, and it's not the parody type series they usually pick up.  Looks to be excellent, but again I'll withhold final judgment till I see another episode or two.

On a somewhat different topic, I'm making preliminary plans to head to Japan for Golden Week next year.  I have the good luck of multiple friends in Tokyo so I don't have to worry about a hotel or anything.  The basic plan is to explore Tokyo, visit Gin and hopefully spend a day in Kyoto.  Depending on circumstances I may be able to extend my visit for a little longer than a week even.

Anyway that's all the news for now.