Mazinger Z

Help!

Today my father was cleaning the garage, and he found these toys.

I remember playing with them when I was a little kid. They're obviously Japanese robots, but what are they exactly?

Japanese friends, can you help me?

今日、ぼくの父はガレジをそじしました。このおもちゃを見つけりました。ぼくのこども時のおもちゃですけどなんですか。

やっぱり日本のロボトです。日本人の友達、このロボトはなんですか。

Yume Nikki

In my travels across the Internet, I came across something called "Yume Nikki".

"Yume Nikki" is a free, home-made game (同人ソフト) that follows a shut-in (引き籠もり) girl, Madotsuki. The game starts in her apartment, where you can go outside on the terrace, turn on her TV, or play a very simple video game on her Famicom. She refuses to go outside.

The real game starts when Madotsuki when goes to sleep. By going to her bed, Madotsuki falls asleep and begins to dream. Her dream is the game, and it really starts in her dream apartment. Only when dreaming will she leave her apartment, which leads to a room of 12 doors. Each door takes you to a different area to explore.

The game is amazing. Although the graphics are 16-bit, they do a great job displaying this bizarre and sometimes disturbing dream world. The sound effects and music add to the uncomfortable feelings, and actually, the melody when Madotsuki writes in her diary is really good.

The game is basic in that you just explore her dream, getting new abilities that let you explore more of the dream. The game is over when she finds all the abilities, and its quite an ending…

Its hard to really describe the game well enough to do it justice, so why not take a look at this preview?

Shangri-La

どの場所で

どの声で

Good

The characters - The characters were the best part of the series. All well-designed and interesting, they were the most captivating part of the series.

The colors - Shangri-La's colors are bright, well-balanced, and beautiful.

The music - The opening and closing songs (by May'n and Midori, respectively) were particularly good.

The premise - The idea of a Tokyo that cannot fully rebuild due to global carbon restrictions is a cool idea. The "carbon economy" was very interesting, especially since a similar idea is kicking around in real life regarding how corporations operate.

High drama! - The series did a great job balancing a variety of emotions throughout, and ended nearly every episode with some kind of suspenseful scene.

Bad

Too much, too fast - There were tons of story elements, many of which seemed to be included to continue to raise interest throughout the series. Unfortunately, most of these points were resolved or explained in rushed, snippets of convenient dialogue in the final few episodes.

God from the machine - By the end, the series was a huge pageant of deus ex machine, with most things being settled way too conveniently. This was too much, even for a show about a pink-haired, boomerang-wielding girl.

Not only is this the saddest scene in the series, it is the saddest seen ever. Ever!

Lady Ryoko is such a bitch - I love her.

3/9/10

Well, I guess I'm going to have to call out sick from work tomorrow...

RX-78-2 Gundam Ver. 2.0 (Part 5)

Finally, the path of Gunpla comes to an end.

Below are pictures of the final, painted and coated RX-78-2.

The top coating really gave the model an awesome matte finish. The white parts of the model have a look and feel similar to a Mac keyboard, actually.

Amuro Ray's workaholic, negligent, and ultimately insane father would be proud...

RX-78-2 Gundam Ver. 2.0 (Part 4)

Techniques

Some readers may be interested in Gunpla, and might have some questions.

"What spray paints do you recommend?"

"Is there an advantage to using a top coat?"

"How much time does a model take to build?"

Those are all great questions. What you're going to want to do is get comfortable cursing. When dealing with hundreds of small, fragile plastic pieces, as well as several different cans of spray paint and coating, something will go wrong. That's natural, but you need to be prepared. Therefore, I recommend preparing a good salvo of curses. You'll want to go with the most guttural sounding ones with the least syllables. You should preferably use ones with vowels such as "u" and "o", and ending in either hard "k" or blunt "nt." sounds. When that knee joint snaps, and it will, you're going to need to be able to curse immediately, loudly and properly. Don't force it - just say what comes out naturally. The problem you encounter will help you choose. For example, a string of curses following a slowly building, frustrating issue (such as a stuck part) will differ greatly from a sudden, surprising shattering of a piece. Below are some real life examples that I encountered personally.

Example 1

I put the neck piece under the head, but didn't tuck the connecting pieces properly, so I had to take it off and start over. The neck was stuck on too tight, however, so I took a pair of pliers and tried to pull it off... when suddenly *SNAP*!

"Oh f*ck!!! F*CK!!"

Example 2

The arms have several pieces of armor on them, including a small piece above the elbow. I placed it on the left arm, but it didn't fit right, so I took it on and off a few times and then it just crumbled into a bunch of pieces...

"You've got to be f*cking kidding ME!!!!!"

I hope this helps. The hobby can seem overwhelming at first, but with a little guidance, there's nothing to be afraid of.