Otakon 2010 - Thursday/Friday

So we didn't do anything Otakon related on Thursday, but it was a good day, so I'm going to shove it in with Friday's activities.

So Cass picked me up around 1, we grabbed Suri, and headed down to Baltimore. We stopped at a rest stop for lunch, and then headed down to UMBC, where we're staying in Cass's apartment on campus. We got ourselves settled in, and then headed over to the local Safeway to pick up some food/snacks for the weekend.

I made steak sautéed in olive oil (I am the most Italian), a box of white cheddar & broccoli Pasta-Roni, and a bag of frozen broccoli for dinner. Cass made a box of cupcakes for dessert. It was the most delicious. For those of you who didn't know, I absolutely love to cook. So getting to cook dinner for my friends (while wearing an awesome blue apron!) was great.

Suri played some Twilight Princess, I played some Cate West: The Velvet Keys, and we made a lot of jokes about mangos being 100 cents, Death Note's "Take this potato chip... AND EAT IT!!!", and various other things we all found funny over the course of the day. Just being out of the house is nice, and I enjoyed hanging around and just being kind of nerdy and awesome with two of the most important people in my life.

Friday rolled around and Cass dropped Suri and I off at the convention center. We picked up our badges and began heading around the convention. We met up with friends and took pictures of cosplayers until it was around time for a Q&A panel with Jerry Jewel, who voices Vino/Claire from "Baccano!".



The previous Q&A for Todd Haberkorn was still going on, so we sat in in the end of it and figured out that he voiced Firo from "Baccano!", which was pretty cool also. They are hilarious men, and will also be voicing Italy and Russia (respectively) in the dub of "Axis Powers Hetalia" with crazy accents. I've never been too into Hetalia, but I do love crazy accents so I may watch it just for that.

After that, Suri and I made a few round in the dealer's room and artist's alley to scout out things we might want to buy and what booths had the best prices. While doing that, we also found some of my favorite cosplayers of the day.



Once we'd made a few rounds, we went back and started buying things. I didn't figure there would be much I wanted, but I managed to find a good handful of Nia figures to buy, plus a few other little Bleach things that I couldn't resist.



The "cookies" are actually zipper-pulls/keychains. They are really really cute. The "decorated" cookies are of Abarai Renji and Hitsugaya Toshiro, the two square cookies are of Kuchiki Byakuya and Hirako Shinji, and the chocolate cookies is just squares. I don't really know what it is. If I can find the booth again, I may buy a few more tomorrow and see what else I can get.



I also found this poster in the artist's alley. While making my rounds, there wasn't really a whole lot that I wanted. There were things at the tables of friends that I'd planned to pick up (and will go back for tomorrow since I didn't get to today), but there wasn't much I wanted to buy. Then I saw this Bakuman poster by Rikyo (of Studio Painted Blade), and just stopped dead in my tracks. He asked if I saw anything I liked, I pointed at it, and said "That." I paid the $10 for the poster and we had a brief conversation about how great Bakuman is.

After that we caught up with Cass and headed back to the apartment. I made chicken, corn, and chicken-flavored rice-a-roni for dinner, and now we're all hanging around unwinding after a full, very eventful day. Tomorrow we plan to take another spin around the dealer's room and the artist's alley and then see what happens.

All of our pictures from this weekend can be found in this album on Photobucket. It is full of fantastic cosplayers, so do go take a look!

1960's Aquaman had some of the best writers ever.

Gonna start out by saying that I'm going to be testing out the new "Zemanta Assistant" that Blogger is offering in this post. See how I like it. I'm curious about how not having to look for images and things on my own. So lets give it a test run while i do a bit of nerding, shall we?

As a young kid, I had two fictional crushes that I have never been able to get over. One is Lt. Surge from Pokemon, and the other is Aquaman. Judging by my track record on this blog, the obvious choice to blog about would be Lt. Surge, but instead I'm going to talk a bit about Aquaman.

Image via Wikipedia

I watched Cartoon Network pretty consistently as a kid, and back in the old days, they aired a hell of a lot of super friends. And, for some reason I took a quick liking to Aquaman. But those who know me always know I'm a big fan of the underdogs. Sure he didn't seem really powerful, but doing a lot with a little appeals to me way more than doing a little with a lot. So, Aquaman doing the impossible while primarily telling fish what to do seemed pretty cool to me. Not to mention I'm a shore girl, born and bred. So It just kind of clicked.

Well, recently I came into owning the first volume of "DC Showcase Presents: Aquaman". 49 comics. Mid-1959 to the end of 1962. I'm currently about 1/3 of the way in, at a comic from March 1960. I think Suri tried to warn me, but god damn silver-age writing... That is some seriously, seriously crazy shit. From the looks of things, logic was at an all time low in 1960.

Let's check out my top 5 moments from what I've read so far. Again, I apologize for the crappy quality of these images. My only camera is my cell phone and this book doesn't fit on my scanner properly.



5) Giant Ball of Kryptonite
This thing was in two issues, and at the end of each Aquaman just shoves it deeper and deeper into the ocean. Because god forbid Superman should ever want to have a nice beach day, right? It's one of those things where I just wonder why in the hell he didn't have a whale or a hammerhead destroy it. Unless he's saving it in case Supes tries to make fun of his fish powers again.



4) Cheating On Tests Is A-Okay!
So Aqualad wants to go to school. That's a good lesson for kids, right? Sure it is. So Aqualad spends about two weeks in class, getting used to school, and then they test him to see what grade he should be in since he's had no formal education before. But on the way to his test, Aqualad gets hit in the head with a boat and catches some mild amnesia. Somehow he's not late to the test and is still forced to take it.

So, Aquaman, deciding to try and help, has all of his fish do things that will alert Aqualad to the answers to his test. Because that's not cheating at all. Of course it isn't. If you forget the answers, getting them from somewhere is not cheating in the slightest. Why didn't you ever come help me pass my Physics tests this way, Aquaman?



3) What Else Could Possibly Try To Kill Us?
Four kids steal a boat, not having any idea how to use it. Aquaman's called to bring them back so the owners of the boat can punish them. Aquaman decides that getting beaten up by angry fishermen isn't enough to scare them away from doing something like this again, even though that would be enough to terrify most grown men. so he decides to pull a bunch of dangerous pranks on the kids instead.

The really tragic part of all this is that Aquaman was totally right. While after the first prank or two, two of the kids have probably pissed themselves, the other two keep believing that sooner or later the ocean will stop trying to kill them. Much like Aquaman, I kept going "Seriously, guys?! The giant sea serpents weren't enough to scare you off the water?"



2) Lois Lane: The Worst At Ideas
So Lois got in some kind of accident and some doctors made her into a mermaid to save her. What, medical science? You know you can't do that. Especially not in the 1960's. Lois tries to live happily with Aquaman and somehow gains telepathic control of fish like he has, even though it makes no sense. But she can't forget about good ol' Supes. Eventually, Aquaman gets hurt protecting her from something, and Lois has to get Superman's attention to come help them out.

Of all the things she could have done to get Superman's attention... Using electric eels to spell out an S.O.S., have a bunch of whales or dolphins start flailing around, hell she could have just yelled at him. With his super hearing he'd have noticed. But no. Of all these things, she chooses instead to set off a volcano. thank god she didn't accidentally get anyone killed. Good job, Lois.



1) Superman Becomes Every Single Kind Of Doctor
So, as mentioned in #2, Lois got stuck as a mermaid. But apparently Aquaman isn't good enough for her even though he saved her ass (He did way better later when he picked up Mera.) so she wants to go back to being human. Well this is a complicated medical procedure and if they mess it up, she's totally screwed. But never fear! Super man just read every medical textbook there is. So he is awarded every single doctorate, and can perform the operation!

....Seriously, what?

Great stuff. I wish I had whatever the 1960's DC writers were on. I've read some 2003 Aquaman, and I need to go back and look at some of the stuff from the 90's during the period in which Aquaman was a total goddamn badass. I know he made a few Justice League appearances back then. And of course there is the current "Batman: The Brave And The Bold" version of Aquaman, who's made everyone else think Aquaman's as cool as I've always believed he was.

So there's plenty of Aquaman left for me to cover in the future. You can definitely expect another post on him eventually.

Nerds and Ramen Are Inseparable

Ramen is kind of a staple of my household. I like being able to make quick, easy meals for myself at any time of day since I have a ridiculously erratic eating schedule. I keep a couple boxes of pot-stickers and microwave rice pouches and things around, but there's nothing quite like a good bowl of ramen.

But as I'm sure many of you know, a girl can only eat so much Nissin Top Ramen before things start getting a little stale. Then one day, a friend of mine on LiveJournal mentioned something that caught my eye...

RAMENBOX.COM



I made myself an account and kept the link sitting around in my favorites until I could get money to order a Ramenbox of my own. In the meantime my mom kept picking up packs of Nissin chicken flavor Top Ramen, which I've eaten maybe three bows of and wishing it was something more interesting.

The other day, on a grocery run, I mentioned Ramenbox to mom, and today I pulled up the site so she could check it out. I'd planned to go for a regular 20 slot box, but mom decided we should go for the large 40 slot box! I put one together and we ordered it this afternoon!

They ship via FedEx ground (Which I like, because we're a FedEx loyal family, due to my dad being a courier!) so it'll be here on Monday or Tuesday most likely and we are looking forward to the super cool ramen that we've ordered.

Ramenbox also has the friendliest people in the world on staff. They keep in touch with their customers via their twitter account, and from what I've seen if you have any kind of problem regarding your order they will do what they can to help you out.

Once my box gets here I'll be sure to do another post on all of the great things I packed it with, but in the meantime take a browse around the Ramenbox site. Setting up a box is easy, and is actually a whole lot of fun. I'm sure you won't be disappointed.

SoulSilver Is Where It's At, Kids.

It's pokemon time kids.

It seems that regardless of getting it the day it came out and playing obsessively for three days, I've fallen behind everyone else since I had to take a break to go to class. I'm currently training my party up to level 25 (they're at 22 right now) in order to get my fourth gym badge. I have friends who are already fighting the Elite Four for the first time. Hopefully devoting my weekend to pokemon will catch me up.

But guys, this game is just as glorious as I anticipated.



Suri and I preordered. I got SoulSilver because it is the best and I have a massive crush on Lugia (and have since I was little) and Suri got HeartGold because it's required of us to have opposite versions. I kind of expected him to buy both, but I guess not. Either way, I really had to fight him on this because SoulSilver is where all the fun is and Ho-Oh is a jerk. Tru fax.

Pre-ordering came with a spectaaaacular bonus -- Lugia and Ho-Oh figures, depending on which version you bought. The only reason I bothered pre-ordering is because this Lugia figure is SO GLORIOUS.



The Ho-Oh? not quite so much. Lugia is doing this magnificent "rising from he sea" kind of thing. He's got water flying everywhere, dripping off the spines on his back, generally being a total badass. Ho-Oh is in a fairly typical pose for him, with some fire around his butt. Not that impressive. It would be disappointing if it was any other set of legendaries and I thought of them on equal terms, but I've never been that into Ho-Oh so I don't really care.

Playing has been a lot of fun. I've loved having one of my pokemon trailing along behind me at all times. Turning around to talk to them produces ADORABLE results, except in pokemon centers when they just get really lazy.



It's amazing how attached a person can get to some programmed pixels. My quilava (named Rayearth because I am a dork) got angry at me for trying to take an item from it and just kept making angry faces at me every time I talked to it. It was fairly upsetting.

The pokewalker has also been a lot of fun. Simple little battles, item finding... I like earning new routes and connecting with friends. I haven't done a whole lot of it but it's been a pretty good time so far.

For the record, I decided to play as a male trainer.



I could claim it was for the sake of nostalgia, since because I never played Crystal I never played a female trainer in Gen II. But really, it's because I didn't want to play as Strawberry Shortcake.



I don't really like her hat, even if the overalls are adorable. And the male trainer has a black and yellow hat, and that's enough to sell me. Either way, I'm playing as a dude, and I am loving it.

The one thing that I do truly miss is Sinnoh's Underground.



The Underground was my favorite part of Gen IV. I loved this place. It was my favorite thing to do. Item hunting became a passion of mine. It's how I made all of my money. It was my favorite thing about Gen IV and made up for the HORRIBLE FAILURE that is the battle frontier. I wish there was some way to include it in SoulSilver, but i suppose I understand why it wasn't.

So I guess I'll makee another post on the subject once I've played more. Take care, kids.

Atelier Annie - Part 1

So it's been... a month since my last post? But I have a (not very) good reason for my absence... I've been playing Atelier Annie pretty much non-stop since February 14th.

You maybe unaware, but I am completely obsessed with the Atelier series of video games. Specifically, Atelier Marie. Tragically, this franchise has been mostly doomed in the US and has seen minimal release over here. (Which has been slowly changing, thank god.) It's something I whine about to anyone who will listen on a regular basis.

But on Valentines Day, my boyfriend and I were at the mall and dropped into gamestop because I was in the hopes of wandering across a used copy of Katamari Damacy. Not finding it, we decided to stare at the DS games and talk about pokemon and complain about how expensive the Bleach games are for a while.

That was when Suri looked up at the top shelf and spotted a game I would have completely missed due to being a shorty -- Atelier Annie.



I bought it on the spot and have been playing it obsessively for the past month. I've beaten it three times since the day I bought it and am midway through my 4th playthrough. Now, I haven't been playing constantly, even if I have been playing a lot. (After all, I've had school to deal with too.) This game is pretty quick. Personally, I wish it was a bit longer, but I suppose I should expect as much from a DS game in comparison to a console game. I can get through the whole of Atelier Annie in about three days if I play a little when ever I have a spare half an hour or so.

But as quick to play through as it is, this game is fun and incredibly challenging. As I said, I've beaten the game three times and have not been able to meet the highest objective. I've only gotten two different endings, and man on my third playthrough I seriously hauled ass to try and make Meister. But no go.

I guess I should probably tell you all about the game before I continue rambling on and on about how much I love it and you, your mom, and everyone you know, should rush out and buy it and get them to bring more Atelier state-side. I'm going to swipe a quote from TVTropes that sums up Atelier more accurately than I could ever do.

"Okay, you know how every RPG has the grand heroes chosen by fate to become wonderful friends and stand up to the evil sorcerer/empire/corporation/monster and keep it from destroying the world?

This game is not about them.

You know how in almost every RPG, buried about halfway down the final dungeon, sitting next to the second to last save point in the game there's a shopkeeper who has every healing item in the game and every weapon or bit of armor that doesn't require an epic quest? The one who leaves you wondering: "Just how in blazes did she get down here? I'm the ridiculously powerful chosen one and it's almost impossible for me to do it so how did a lowly shopkeeper pull it off"?

This game is about her."

-Anonymous Internet poster, succinctly summing up the spirit of the entire franchise.

This is one of the things I love most about Atelier. Your primary means of driving the plot is not roaming the land kicking ass and crawling dungeons. It's sitting in your workshop for days on end making the best fucking items you can make and selling them to people that need them. Of course you do go out and stuff happens and you fight monsters, but it's a vastly different progression than, say, Final Fantasy.

The plot of Annie is a little ridiculous, but therein lies the charm. You play Annie, a young girl from a family of well known alchemists. Annie herself has no desire to do all the work involved in being an alchemist and just wants to "marry up" so she won't have to worry about any of that.

Annie's parent,s sick of her just laying around, go to Betner, her grandfather (I have no idea if he's maternal or paternal.), and complain. So, in his infinite crazy-old-man wisdom, he kidnaps her in her sleep and has her move across an ocean to Sera Island, where a resort is being set up.

Annie wakes up in the company of a fairy named Pepe who Betner asked to be your alchemy teacher. He gived you a letter from Betner that explains the situation, which Annie realizes is ridiculous (and maybe a little illegal). He's soon joined by Hans, a young member of the committee at the head of the restoration.



Hans explains about the resort development and the contest between all of the alchemists involved, all competing to make Sera Island a popular resort over the next three years.

Now I need to step in and warn you not to be afraid of the phrase "three years". This is (obviously) not in real time. It is not a long period of time to get through. it is actually notoriously short. Especially when some higher level items take nearly a week to make, not including any time you need to make the items it takes to create them. Not to mention anywhere from one to three or four days to travel from your workshop to your resort facilities or places to gather items (and time spent there). The time adds up really quick, guys.



But back to the plot...

Hans takes you to the opening ceremony of the development project and, for some ridiculous reason (this is Atelier after all), the king puts up the right to marry one of his children as a prize for the alchemy contest. Marrying a hot prince? Hey isn't that Annie's goal in life? Nothing lights a fire under a girl's ass quite like the prospect of not having to do actual work ever again.

So he has you do a quick assignment (Making a sign for your shop.) and then he explains a bit more about how playing works. then you're given your second assignment, get some access to gathering points (to get ingredients for alchemy) and then you're off and running.

Year 1 is mostly about getting your alchemy skills up and building resort facilities (like a theme park or a spa) and getting to know the game's NPCs. It's not until year two that plots start cropping up.



So next time I'll cover the things that go on in year 2, all of the NPCs you hang out with, and the developing plot. Though a post on Ace Attorney Investigations may come before that since I'm midway through playing that, and Suri's currently got my copy of Annie so he can enjoy the fun that is Atelier.

The Little Prince

Last year, I spent six months of my life adapting Antoine De Saint-Exupery's "The Little Prince" into a 16 page comic. I dove into the project head first and never looked back. And since then I've seen references to it surface time and time again. I now own four different copies of the book (paperback, hardcover, paperback in French, and a pop-up book) and have been enjoying pick out references to it in other media.

After I finished the project, I took a trip out into the city with Suri. This was when Union Square's huge Virgin Megastore was closing, so everything was ridiculous levels of cheap. So, while looking around in the children's section, to my surprise and wonderment I found a box set of the entire 26-episode animated series from the 1980's.



I've had it for months now but just haven't gotten around to watching it. But tonight I decided to pop in the first disc and take a swing at it. The first few episodes were separate from the story in the book and was primarily Prince going around to various countries and saving lives or something. He went up in a hot air balloon, got trapped on a grounded ship, went looking for gold, and nursed an injured seagull back to health. All wonderful little stories with wonderful little morals for little 1980's children. And children today. I should raise some kids on this shit.

Then I hit episodes 5 and 6, and they were ones more closely derived from the book. Episode 5 focused on the Prince and the Pilot and was really adorable and was a nice adaptation from the book into the context of the series. The Pilot is also the narrator for the whole series, so we'd heard him talk before and he was incredibly, hilariously French (though it's pretty appropriate, given the book).

But episode six was focused on the Prince and the Rose. Aside from Swifty, who is some kind of space-bird, who kept telling Prince to go travel the galaxy, it actually stuck pretty closely to the story in the book. The whole thing was half an hour of deja-vu for me really, because it matched fairly closely (though was highly expanded upon) to what I'd done for my project. It was a little hard to watch sometimes! But in a good way!



I'm really eager to make my way through the next three discs. I don't get to see the Fox until late disc 3, but the 80's handled this series very beautifully and gracefully and I am so excited to watch the rest.

Late To The Party - Wind Waker Edition

So, a million years after everyone else, I am finally playing Wind Waker on Gamcube. Not that I bought a game cube more than like a year ago. >__> I just never bothered. But I was sick today, and broke out the copy of Wind Waker I borrowed from Suri two months ago and decided to play a little.

I haven't gotten far. I'm in the stupid bird fortress, getting arrested left and right by pigs and being unable to properly swing from lamps. I'm also not having fun with the camera controls because they are a right pain in the ass and do not always do what I want. All the while, Tetra is screaming at me through a magic rock and it is really not helpful. It's like a less annoying but not nearly as useful Navi.

But I've been having fun running around under barrels, enjoying the visuals of the game, and anticipating everyones Wind Waker jokes finally making sense.

Clover Pt. 1 - "I wish for happiness. I seek happiness." (Volumes 1 & 2)

-- Warning: There's some spoilers here. That's why this blog is named what it is. --

So recently I picked up CLAMP's "Clover". I have wanted to read "Clover" for ages, but before I ever got a chance to pick it up, it went out of print. But the wonderful people at the manga division of Dark Horse put out an  omnibus edition of all four volumes and couldn't resist grabbing it last time I was in the Borders in our local mall.

It seems like that borders is where all of the Monmouth County otaku work, because everyone in there will talk to me about what I'm buying. the woman I spoke with that day was very excited that I was picking up "Clover" and warned me that it was probably the saddest thing that I would ever read. I laughed it off and replied "I've been reading CLAMP for years. I can handle it."

I should have listened to her warning.

When I finally decided to read it, I read it all in one go. It's a four volume series, but today I'm only going to cover the first two since they make up the main story.

I'd expected this, because I hate to leave a manga unfinished. It was slow to get started. They introduced a lot of things right off that I did not really understand, and it kept me from getting absorbed into the world at first. But I trust CLAMP to deliver, so I pushed on.

The first two volumes focus on the story of Sue and Kazuhiko. The retired government agent who lost his right hand, Kazuhiko, must transport the mysterious young Sue to a location that only she knows. Along the way is the repeated theme of a song about seeking happiness. This song is sung by Kazuhiko's deceased girlfriend, Ora.

They receive help from Gingetsu, Kazuhiko's former C.O., and Ran, a boy as mysterious as Sue who is living with him. They run into trouble along the way in the form of people trying to capture Sue, as she is something called a "Four Leaf Clover". The biggest adversary is some guy named Bols, who knows Kazuhiko -- but for the life of me I have never figured out how.

Bols seems to be the leader of another country/group/something's army. He's the one who cut off Kazuhiko's hand on his last mission, but there's no more about that that's ever discussed. The relationship between Bols (who really seems like he wants to molest/do bad things to Kazuhiko) and Kazuhiko, and the mission that lead to Kazuhiko losing his hand is the only thing in this story that they never really go into. You'd think since Kazuhiko is the focus of the story, they'd discuss it but apparently not.

As we go on, they arrive at the destination that Sue wanted to be taken to, a defunct amusement park called "Fairy Park". (Readers of Tsubasa may recall Fairy Park from the end of the "Oto" saga. ;D) 

It is then that we learn about the "clovers". They are children sorcerers who were taken by the government to be isolated and controlled. They were labeled from one to four "Leaves" by how powerful they were.  Ran is a three leaf, one of two still alive. Sue is the only Four Leaf Clover.

We also learn about the song, titled "Clover", that Sue has been listening and singing along to over the course of the manga. It was actually written by both she and Ora, and is sung by both of them. She and Ora knew each other, and Ora told her all about singing and Kazuhiko.

Sue confesses her love for Kazuhiko just before they are attacked, apparently by the people who originally locked Sue away. Sue uses her power to save Kazuhiko as they are attacked by Bols again. Gingetsu stops Bols as Sue destroys Fairy Park and herself. Ran is sad, but seems glad that Sue managed to free herself from the life she'd been living, even if it meant her death.

Kazuhiko realizes that this had been Sue's intention all along. It's easy to see on his face that he's sad, but we don't spend enough time with him to learn if he's really heartbroken about it and loved her as well.

This first part of the story was tragic, and very sad, but in the next two volumes we get into the background of "Clover" and that is where my heart really broke.