#Pile's digi-art

[pileoftrashsstuff]

Noticed my dumbass hasn't posted anything in months and I'm still not done clowning Thomas so here are two hotshots as filler

Not shaded under the cut:

[leopoldainter]

To

む which is ム which isn't Clarke Westerfeld who are you is who you feel mile mi like flipping on hand gun

TV

Isn't about ebooks an theater was just starting Spiderman reboots to the surprise of no one who reads the Chrysalids because that would telepathic be real broke hen there's other brexits options ope brevity fits will rest in case it sees fit at elephant in the tomb you voting fortida tilde cold and sill steal seathes reason states plan something written out by now ima assu.em evil diamond apparition and spook chansey

Elephant inthe germaine in hudson woth grass and horse past thepost to first or second wait till they settle the congressional ball diamond down

Button in oush pushed on for life position outreads treason the reason to song and rings there's other things to fear when the wars on something going from some place i want to be thinking as if to fix a sinking coal mines to hemisphere so radio war dies at the world marked it rhere a one count of a kd of some idiot i know somewhere eventually you see pikachu switch his togepi to happier than before and clip art icl. To icicil3s shonda her heart coaster this pl ace all rhe time some say to stay wall to y'all is the same when there's up there down in there in here is to near then they have a toonie in Canada and if it's switches switched you'll which are area 519

Even two bitches ain't right about roundAbout Ira Needles more less waterloo any days now Uma course back home pretty close to the time it was passed between the car door bled our gravel changed route theres a raving here about it and here's up the ravie where you afraid some of what's pourd into the open area ein neighborhoo again thw twigs and bra downravinegravel pile quarry being sup neighbour's here and here's road aginst some fen,g here's an example f64 Renoir Dr. Lounge rooms laundry list of examples quota. Quora has authentic matching maple simpsons duhR

Some doanwindu go franking shales chalking halo looks up mini mouse see sEgth that write between bouts ou unplud

In everything

Drips ans drabs aren't some ose are hers there's clothes up on there cuz there held in clothes don't fly off grown grabs horse trick invoi evil harry to make your self thFs in everything what is not is how's it halp English to see stem straight to lcd abbys a bitche downtown overnight

Like another country far away

M

r. ROBOT

Fauci does all of this assuming documents purportedly naming him as pentecostal christ are listening and responding to his puppet chalmer

A small bit was Elaine's fault for throwing 9ut the soup recipes in some form of segregation bin say I know what I can do with this and make sure that no one can see where your reaching and

Do you know who you know did it

I think i can figure out who broke it

Ok is there any miss digi megas

Di Giovanni is fine, I brought my degree. Barstool.

Ok so we haveyou standing here hold this with

both hands

Woah camera lady hows

Can we bring in the lisp gurgke

Can I have headphones maybe

Shut up showtime

Ok rec. 1 C I want to put it in KY mouth

Not that uflattest Toblerone ever Are we doing a

Halloween run

Boris

Brought my degrees

Fucking good luck sitting on what are the dvds

Who else's is yelling at them

[jadedjoshe]

Digi-Art Gallary

Looking for jus a pile of all my art? Its all shoved together on my Ko-Fi!

All of my art is free to use under license (be sure to check which license to know how my art can be used).

You do not have to be a supporter to use my art!

[jainlakshit33]

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[melodicwitchlight]

haruto has brown hair ;; cropped haircut, and is wielding a sword 🗡 as he fights the chocolate and caramel dragon in the sugar falls event. raphael and some other friends were fighting alongside him.

he holds the sword in his white paw ;; light rainbow swirling within.

I. Digis hosting ran out.

II. Centrally reformed in the Underground : Digis Discord.

III. Bat said forums and profiles are still here, in response to my evaluation article : Underground General. She showed screenshots of the site in Announcements. Pinned post in General.

IV. Evaluation Article of Site Retained in Launch: Profile, Pet, Gingerbread Cottage, Inventory. Forums : Present Community Threads, Roleplay sub-forums : Past + Current, Art.

V. Digis. Characters' Stories and Biographies : Andy, Valerie, Haruto, Lucinda, Marissa James, Corentin, Candace, Nimueh, Akiko, Ava, Alan, Ozera, Spiral, Siberian Husky, Keandra, Celina, Alysanne, Sefa, Draegan, Cinaed, Draegan, Minyup, Cinaed.

VI. Threads. Valentine.

VII. Can write drabbles here or sanctificetur.

VIII. Forums + official site re-launching in near future : Underground acknowledgement. See: Point IV when looking around the site.

IX. Digis community having storage channels for their characters and roleplaying and chatting in external platform and harmonising a continued beautiful love and hope. They also talk about creating stories for nibbles they do not have on their profile too, the dress up option broadening one's creativity.

X. My nibbles are portrayed in their beautiful familial wholeness, and some other random ones that agonistically rubble piled on my nibble personality not being heard and loved as they are, I judged for myself and deleted.

XI. I kept the Digis Community's Skypes word document only in LP4, not in cloud in the mountains, for when I actually want to friend request one or some or all.

XII. Cloud In The Mountains : Gingerbread Cottage.

it was a long fight, they fighting in the caves, having made it through the insidious licorice swamp ( where they met marissa ), and through the waterfall.

[elecmon]

ALSO I FORGOT TO MENTION i hit 3K followers like a week or so ago

IVE BEEN WANTING TO DO LIKE?? A GIVEAWAY???

prize wise ive been stuck on like either a vital bracelet or like a survive copy or fuckin IDK i havent hosted a tumblr giveaway before how are names picked, how d

do you just type up everyones urls or is there a 3rd party site that does that FOR you

[digitalisc]

i heard about the sora pile very late lkjdfjghjf i had to whip up a whole new good boy lmao.

[dunderella]

sketches i did in class while the teacher was talking today

[blueporl]

decided to mass drop the rest of my attacks! here’s all the Cookies because i made a bunch near the end XD the other ones will be in their own pile

top left is Cereal Cookie, who belongs to billiam top right is Gummy Worm Cookie, who belongs to barbie/@anteros-art​

bottom left is Lemon Soda Cookie, who belongs to pastelmarbl3/@pastelmarbl3 bottom right is Digi Cookie, who belongs to rabbitclown/@rabbitclown

[maijily]

Here’s Digi chillin’ listening to his iPod on a pile of glitches resembling a couch.

Author’s notes: HOLY FRICK WHATTTTT-- THIS LOOKS SO CLEAN I CAN’T-

I’VE BEEN APPROACHED BY THE ANGEL OF ART THIS LOOKS SO AMAZING AND POLISHED AND BEAUTIFUL, LOOK AT THAT BOIII your style is AMAZING AND PERFECT DON’T EVER CHANGE

[pileoftrashsstuff]

That Mr Bubbles fit tho 🤡

Anyways guess who got too inspired

[shinssoliloquy]

WHO? WHAT? WHERE? WHY? HOW?

5 Questions you should ask anyone when they’re starting off a project made from the basis of ego and tenacity. I’m really not a particularly smart person, But I’m smart enough to know how dumb I really am.

I’ve always been itching to do this. Twitter was never a great way to display my thoughts and writing on grounds that by limiting characters your characters by tweet you’d either get into long threads of diatribes that likely no one will even read or you’d have to space out your thoughts and mince words in order to fit to these said limitations. Obviously it’s not a bad way per say to fully flesh out your thoughts but there’s obviously some downsides and you won’t be fully capable of fulfilling those quandaries, much so espousing on your thoughts and opinions to the fullest extent. I could write a book but I’m not knowledgeable enough feel like my thoughts are worth putting into a non-fiction book. I could join discord servers but I don’t know a wreath of people who even care. I could still talk off into the Twitter void but that’s only for short bursts at a time, any ideas or subjects I’d like to elucidate or spell out would just get lost, all my themes would shoot off into the negative space that is a twitter timeline regardless of if they’re worth revisiting or not.

But of course, would it even matter if people do care or they don’t. People live off making Youtube videos and content based on themselves because they assume people actually care about whatever benign thought or creative pursuit they’d have in their head. It’s not up to me to judge if my thoughts are worth putting out there but I guess the reason people use social media is to give a voice to the voiceless, have anyone out there a chance of their own success, But how does that affect content input though, How does impact your very own mental psyche. This is a conversation for another post and it’s far from a topic I’ll have any meaningful outlook on, just from my own experiences as an outsider looking in.

WHO?

I always fancied myself a writer more than an illustrator. The whole crux of my need to learn how to draw was from the idea that “hey no one wants to draw my webcomic ideas on something awful or whatever internet messaging board I was using at the time that’ll date this post when I look back on it when I’m 40, I’ll learn how to draw then and show everyone I can STILL MAKE IT” Then I started drawing and never really looked back. Within the few years or so since I’ve made that discovery I never really focused on my writing, much less my creative writing. I’ve had few instances where I’d try to light up my spark by blog posting was making other short lived wordpresses and blogspots where I can peruse and write for a short while until I get bored and go back to drawing everyday. Of course two particular things happened in which I’ve gotten that spark back, to an extent. 1. The corona virus quarantine happened and I was stuck with nothing to do, I dropped out of school to go to a new college out of country that hasn’t really happened yet and aside from my retail job I haven’t had a good outlet for where to put my creativity too. So I ended up just drawing more but also, reading off some books off my backlog. I’ve always been interested in philosophy and non-fiction since reading Kant and Hume at age 12 and Now rediscovered it because of quarantine. Really I’ve always been a better writer or story teller than anything else but efforts to light up that energy in me has been fruitful and I’ve relegated to being another artist in the pile of artists who’s only personality is that they “like art”. Which made me realized how much of a better self sufficient and self respecting the writer can be rather then the animator. Illustrations are fleeting, words stick with you. Of course greats work of art exist and will always exist. Beautiful paintings can grip me just as much as a good work of philosophy can, But lately beautiful paintings have been disgruntled and disavowed from public schema. If you want to provide good art for people to see, use hashtags and make fast fleeting content for people to consume easily and forget about. Such is the way of social media and how they grip you to keep using their products, It’s not a revolutionary idea but it’s a concept that ends up working. In a way I’d like to counteract this by making fast fleeting content but also putting in forth ideas and writings which I can consider good but we’ll see how that ends up panning out. My goals as an artist is for another topic entirely but really I need a way to practice my non-fiction writing skills and having a blog where I can just go on and on about pointless shit is good exercise. 2. I’ve stopped communicating to people that would point me to a direction in life I didn’t really need to go through and because of that I took a detour in my mental stability and mental development, really it wasn’t good for me. but because of that I was able to keep track of where I need to go and have removed all elements in my life that can allow me to find different paths and know where I’ll truly be. I could also just talk to people about these kinds of stuff but it’s hard to really find people who I can talk about the stuff I want to talk about with and nothing really beats writing a whole diatribe about whatever comes to your mind at the time. Why do I have a lot on my mind? You’ll hear that story in another time but it’s MOST likely an autism thing.

WHAT?

Look at section: Who again but to summarize and clarify what I mean. Content is fast fleeting and non-self actualizing, people don’t want ideas they want content, They need personalities to leech off and see themselves in instead of being creatives themselves. As someone who makes art and wants to make more art It’s hard to really judge if my art is worth it for the algorithm or if it’s worth it to bring in audience retention. Not to mention most people who use social media are kids, and the only way to grab kids attention is to play to their interests, play into their already corroded brains by playing onto their synapses, Not to imply I dislike it per say but more so that I feel that certain audience can somewhat affect your creative output. 

WHERE?

I made a Medium account last month after reading an article on Luxury Communism. It was a fine article but what I got out of it was how good it seems to use Medium to communicate and write articles like these, Until I realized that really it can only be used for more academic pieces and while sure I’d like to do that one day something more lowkey and personal was what I really needed. Hence a tumblr, originally a blogging website before being used to oxidize internet discourse and internet creativity in general, was a perfect outlet for these kinds of posts. I’m actually used to using tumblr for one and can edit and know my way around doing these sorts of posts and the archive feature is good if I ever want to look back on old posts as opposed to Twitter. I can use the ask feauture to take requests or have feedback on my posts in a more concise manner. Unlike Medium or Wordpress I can easily hide certain posts or even the entire account if I wanted too and I won’t be seen or be recommended by the algorithm because I won’t even put tags on these posts. If you know where to find me you know where to find me. Although I do think I’ll make this public at some point I atleast need to know if I’ll even use this or if I’ll even keep making the same kinds of posts as I’d want too.

WHY? 

I’ve already explained why you knucklehead, but I guess here were some of my inspirations to make a writing blog. I could list actual writers or twitter personalities or internet reviewers with blogs I can talk about, for example Yahtzee Crosshaw, Film Crit Hulk, Or even the elusive Andrew Hussie when he had a wordposts and while those people were instrumental to my development as a writer and artist I can’t say they were my full inspiration for making this.

Back in 2016, I was introduced to the Procrastinators’ Podcast by consuming Digibro content and having her podcast be linked at the end of one of her videos. I’ve since started concurrently watching her podcast and while I’ve always sucked into Digi’s cult of personality I’ve started appreciated her other friends in the podcast too, everyone except Nate. One of those members I gravitated too was MunchyWearsTinyHats. He was only one year older than me but I could still see myself in him and in effect appreciated him more than anyone in the podcast. We both seemingly grew up watching and reading the same shit, Homestuck, TF2, He introduced me to Nuclear Throne which because one of my favorite games and we both had the same appreciation for Hussie, Sam Hyde (sadly) Performance art, weird abstract art bullshit and of course My Little Pony. If I actually joined RFCK who knows what would’ve happened but that’s just my take. Of course a surface level description of Munchy aside, as someone who consumed everything he was in, I Lived my life vicariously through him and to all the members of the Procrastinators’ Podcast to an extent even though we both became completely different people as we reached our 20s. Currently he’s 20 and I’m less than a year away to being 20. But I feel as if our paths have drifted far enough that I can properly say I became a whole new different person to who I was in 2016. I still have appreciation for MLP, Homestuck and Minecraft and all the weird media shit me and him consumed. Back then I even modeled my art and persona to look like his too, It was a whole thing. Of course all of these posts and videos and personalities are very very out of date and they don’t reflect the content I consume or even the type of person I am now. I had a friend who also liked the PCP, well it was more like a love-hate relationship I feel but it was nice having someone who I could talk about the PCP with since at this time they were the only people or content creators I was consuming, what’s less said about current pcp the better. She’s always told me, I feel sorry for people who model their lives around these content creators and take advice from them since they clearly don’t know what they’re doing. And while I agree with her to an extent, I wouldn’t go as far as to discredit these artists accomplishments since they seem fulfilled with what they’ve made of themselves, not like we’re doing anything different or are any different to them. It’s about trying to live in a world with your own meaning in it and you can’t do that but disparaging the careers of grown men you don’t even know. Again topic for another day but I guess with this blog I’m always copying and ripping off some of their ideas for myself. In 2019, Munchy made a Tumblr where he’d detail and do the same thing and post blogs or writings he’s made or opinions he’s had, It hasn’t been updated in a year and a half but if it isn’t broke, don’t call the gas company asking for a refund. I even stole his alliteration with Shinsuke’s Soliloquy and Munchy’s Manuscripts, Shinsuke being my real God-given name. Of course the posts on his tumblr are really incredibly out of date and downright stupid and I’ll talk about them on their own on a seperate post since I feel like he really just didn’t know what he talked about and they’re baseline at best and wrong at worst. Regardless he still planted the seed of me as a person to make my own blog and talk about random bullshit.

HOW?

Obviously I will still tweet out stuff on my private twitter, Obviously I will still make art. Right now I’m making my own comics and writing a few short stories that maybe? I’ll put here I’m not really sure. Just depends on if they’re worthy on being posted since I’ll make a short story collection with them instead. Maybe I’ll continue the favorite character writing, maybe I’ll make my own picrew. We’ll see and no doubt these promises will become out of date in a week or two. Rather than the right of the moment malaise of tweeting around bullshit and sending it quickly I’ll use this for more concise text, something that I can sink my teeth in and tap away for what like 5 hours or so? Beats the essays i’d be doing but it doesn’t help that I am typing this in total silence, and I guess those essays will just be posted here. Do people post their school essays like they post their poems or their artwork for school? If you want to use my ask blog then it’s right there if you want a topic for me to talk about or just ask me a regular question. I’m bringing back tumblr asks to it’s real purpose. And of course, the only thing sure about me, is that nothings for sure.

[ekgormandesigns]

I Will Hex you

I Will Hex you

It is Friday night so that means it is time for a brand new Creepy Cute Chronicles from Oddball Art.  This week I am playing with the awesome CCC69 Coffee Hex digi stamp and IMG500 Magical Pile of Creeps.  I don’t know about you, but I would not deny these guys coffee.

For these images I pulled out my colored pencils and colored in this image, and then added some distress oxide in both Vintage…

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #387

Top Ten Ex-Videogame Companies

This week’s Top Ten was originally due to go out a couple of weeks ago, sandwiched between my two SDCC-related Tens. The idea was, it’s sorta-kinda-retro in theme, and that particular weekend was when Digitiser Live took place. Digi is a spin-off (mega evolution?) of the original, 1990s Digitiser teletext magazine, and although President For Life Mr Biffo does discuss and review new games on the revamped Digi website, the whole endeavour really carries with it a flavour of retro. As such, I decided to write something about retro gaming, despite the fact that comparatively I know bugger-all (for informed retro-gaming content, check out Mr B or one of his co-conspirators, like Larry Bundy Jr or Octav1us Kitten).

Then at the last minute I remembered it was the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, and decided to write about that instead.

But anyway! Now I’m back, like a beloved gaming mascot whose best years are behind them, forced to marry their idiosyncratic charms to a gaming zeitgeist that’s left them in the dust, contorting their bodies into contemporary gameplay designs and perspectives that break the magic of their original outing and leave audiences questioning why they ever liked them in the first place. And, as promised, we’re easing back into a retro setting, as I talk about once-beloved organisations from yesteryear who have, sadly, been erased from the save game disk of life.

That’s right, today’s Top Ten is all about dead games companies. For the most part, developers, although a wild publisher might also appear if I feel they had a distinct enough identity to shape the games they put out. These, then, are game companies that I took note of even as a nipper; game companies that helped define my tastes, in a lot of ways. But also companies that are no longer with us, victims of all manner of corporate shenanigans and the ever-shifting sands of taste and commerce. Some of them are outright closed; some of them were folded into a larger organisation and essentially ceased to exist.

So, with no further ado, my favourite defunct games companies. Sob!

Bullfrog Productions (1987-2001): synonymous with a quirky British style of strategy sim, they broke new ground and it felt they could do no wrong in the early 90s. Arguably responsible for my love of strategy and god games. Key titles: Populous (1989), Syndicate (1993), Theme Park (1994)

Westwood Studios (1985-2003): essentially created what we now think of as the real-time strategy genre, and – bit like Bullfrog – one of the reasons I love strategy games. Also made arguably the best film adaptation of all time. Key titles: Eye of the Beholder (1991), Command & Conquer (1995), Blade Runner (1997)

LucasArts (1982-2013): technically LucasArts is still around, but only as a licensor. They used to be a powerhouse, making the best adventure games of all time, and were – for a while – the most trustworthy custodians of the Star Wars franchise. To see them just a corporate shell is such a shame. Key titles: The Secret of Monkey Island (1990), Star Wars: X-Wing (1993), Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II (1997)

Sensible Software (1986-1999): their very name conjures images of glorious Amiga gaming moments, wedded as it is to their biggest success. They made me enjoy football, albeit virtually. And their games had terrific songs. Key titles: Sensible Soccer (1992), Cannon Fodder (1993), Sensible World of Soccer (1994)

Core Design (1988-2010): popularly known as the studio of Lara Croft, for me they were a platforming powerhouse who made lovely, fun games that I enjoyed on my Amiga. Also made a very underrated driving game. Key titles: Chuck Rock (1991), Jaguar XJ220 (1992), Tomb Raider (1996)

Ocean Software (1983-1998): famous for movie licenses and arcade adaptations, Ocean were often the butt of jokes concerning quality and cash-ins. But I have very fond memories of them from early in my gaming life, and they made a fair few classics before being subsumed into a larger corporate entity. Key titles: Batman: The Movie (1989), Rainbow Islands (1990), RoboCop 3 (1991)

Delphine Software International (1988-2004): they made beautiful games, games that simply revolutionised what I thought games could look and play like. They felt like French art films, but games, before I knew what a French art film was. Key titles: Another World (1991), Cruise for a Corpse (1991), Flashback (1992)

Gremlin Interactive (1985-2000): again, one of those companies whose logo I loved to see in the Amiga days. They made sports games, fighting games, iconic platformers; but for me they’ll always be the Lotus company (they’ll also always be “Gremlin Graphics”, but oh well). Key titles: Wanted: Monty Mole (1984), Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge (1990), Zool (1992)

Psygnosis (1985-2012): Mostly famous as a publisher, they had a distinctive style which bled through from their Roger Dean logo into key artwork and the very games they put out; all unmistakeably Psygnosis. Key titles: Shadow of the Beast (1989), Lemmings (1991), Wipeout (1995)

Lionhead Studios (1997-2016): despite their shared DNA with Bullfrog (the only reason they’re not higher, TBH), they made classic, experimental strategy games before becoming defined (and, arguably, swallowed) by one glorious, joyous, hilarious RPG franchise. Key titles: Black & White (2001), The Movies (2005), Fable II (2008)

Well, there we go. There are some older British companies that didn’t quite make the list, largely because there are still big gaps in my 1980s 8-bit gaming experience; Graftgold, for instance, I only really know through Uridium and, later, Fire and Ice. DMA Design was in the pile for a while, but despite my feeling that all their DMA-ness has been lost, you could definitely argue that Rockstar North is DMA Design. Looking Glass would have been there except that the only LG game I really played at the time was Thief; to be honest, I’d have been more true to myself putting Ion Storm in there, as I played more of their games on first release, although even then I have to concede I’m praising a controversial studio just because they made one game that happens to be one of the greatest games ever (Deus Ex, if you’re wondering). But let’s all agree that these are great companies and they made great games!

Rest in peace, you magnificent coding bastards. Or, y’know, just open a new company.

[arcaneranger]

Final Thoughts - Spring 2018

Oh, I am so very late on this one, but in my defense, I did warn that I had too much to watch during the spring, so much so that I actually have to have MAL open in another tab while I’m writing this just to remember everything.

I’ll start with what I skipped.

* Tokyo Ghoul:re, FLCL Alternative, Hozuki’s Coolheadedness Season 2 and High School DxD Hero because I have neither watched the previous seasons nor read the manga.

* Cutie Honey Universe and Gurazeni because by the time I would have gotten to them, I had only heard bad things.

* Dragon Pilot: Hisone to Masotan because Netflix picked it up and we’ll have to wait until September for it.

* Gegege no Kitaro because I didn’t hear any buzz about it and frequently forget that it even exists, I’ll get around to it if enough people ask me to.

* Full Metal Panic! Invisible Victory because Funimation has inexplicably removed the dub from VRV and that’s how I want to experience it.

* Kakuriyo: Bed and Breakfast for Spirits because I already watched Konohana Kitan and didn’t see much of a difference.

* Captain Tsubasa because Viz licensed it and then just kinda sat on it everywhere except the Philippines.

* Inazuma Eleven because it just went completely unlicensed/unloved.

So, with those out of the way, from the bottom to the top, here’s everything I did manage this season.

Worst of the Season: Fist of the Blue Sky Re:Genesis (2/10)

Oh my god, it’s just the ugliest thing this side of Berserk. I don’t remember a damn thing about this one, and I’d bet that most people who watched it are with me on this one, because I was just distracted by how astoundingly awful the CG production in this show is.

Butlers x Battlers (3/10)

Ugh, what a boring slog of a premiere. I still pretty vividly remember this one, if only because it’s so painfully generic that it swung all the way around to be memorable again. Butlers spent almost its entire first episode on absolutely nothing before remembering in the last five minutes that it was supposed to have a plot and smash-cutting to it in the middle of a scene.

Caligula (3/10)

Where to start? After one of the most interesting premieres of the season, this adaptation pretty immediately sank into complete nonsense, and it’s such a massive waste of potential that this was the work of the writers behind the original Persona titles. Caligula is a show where the main characters literally forget the plot is happening and decide to go to a theme park while they’re trapped in a virtual world with a bunch of digi-zombies trying to murder them. Are you kidding me?

Devils’ Line (3/10)

I just did my write-up for this, so it’s a little fresher in my mind, but honestly, it’s just Twilight with adults and the edge factor turned up, and it looks damn silly trying to be as serious as it is. Sentai needs to choose a little more carefully than this if they want to promote their new service.

Libra of Nil Admirari (3/10)

This one was just so boring to look at that I don’t remember anything except that books were evil and it was a visual novel adaptation.

Dances With the Dragons (4/10)

I’m aware that I use the word “generic” an awful lot, but this season’s worst had quite a lot of that quality, and it applies here, too. Trying its hardest to be a mid-aughts grimdark action piece, it just does almost nothing interesting in its premiere, aside from giving the protagonist an already-existing girlfriend, which may have just been an attempt to quell any yaoi-baiting the two main dudes have going for them, because her only qualities demonstrated were “can’t cook” and “looks hot”.

Real Girl (4/10)

As I said in my write-up, I wanted so badly to like this one, but you need a budget of more than fifty cents to make an anime, and nearly every shot betrays just how little the studio was working with. We’re talking about the kind of show where the main cast goes to a summer festival, and appear to be the only people there. The story and writing just aren’t enough to make me put up with it.

Gundam Build Divers (4/10)

What a total letdown from this franchise. Fighters was an incredibly well-written show that was aimed at kids but could appeal to all Gundam fans, Try was divisive but the people that liked it (like me) got a lot out of it, but Divers just flounders. A relatively decent first episode gives way to episode after episode of Villain of the Week shenanigans that I cannot bring myself to care about because the main cast just aren’t interesting; they’re pretty much just generic shonen cardboard cutouts. This was one case where I was almost hoping for a sudden death game turnaround, because the idea of a bunch of kids being trapped in a game with lots of adults and giant robots would at least be a workable plot, but just fighting Team Rocket over and over again is boring schlock.

Magical Girl Ore (4/10)

I held out hope for too long on this one, but I had an inkling from the beginning that the humor was just going to turn me way, way off, and I was right. This one just carried too many bad implications if you thought about it, and they all piled up and crashed down on me the more I tried to keep going.

Magical Girl Site (4/10)

This show just couldn’t stay above water. The writing only got dumber as the plot carried on, and the fact that I was still watching became embarrassing, because most of the community watched one episode of this and dropped it like a hot rock. Hopefully I’ve learned my lesson.

Darling in the FRANXX (5/10)

What total bull, huh? I’ve never seen public opinion on a show turn around as fast as the community ripped Darling to shreds. While it’s visually gorgeous (most of the time), the writing in the second half of the show is just humiliating to everyone involved, as the script becomes a child Godzilla-stomping through a carefully-constructed castle of wood blocks. Once again, I yearn for Inferno Cop.

Persona 5 the Animation (5/10)

I said for the longest time during the lead-up to P5A that I didn’t really see the point of it. Persona 5 is the fastest-selling game in the franchise, and ultimately an adaptation would only serve to recap the plot, because that’s all it would have time to do in only six months. I actually enjoyed Persona 4 The Golden Animation, because it sold itself as a companion piece to the existing plot rather than a retread of it, and seeing the Scooby Gang just hanging out more was precisely what I wanted from it. A-1 Pictures just didn’t learn enough from the sins of Ace Attorney, because while this is better, it’s still not worth watching if you’ve played the game.

Last Period (5/10)

This one got some early buzz for halfway-decent production work and a skewering of gacha-based RPGs, but ultimately ended up repeating itself so often that it became boring, and sidelining the highlight of the show (the villain trio Wiseman) into having barely a few lines per episode. Just goes to show what happens when repeated gags get stale.

Now that those are out of the way, we can get to the stuff I actually finished!

Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Die Neue These (6/10)

Barely worth watching for how badly condensed the plot is, and barely worth talking about until the movies happen. That’s assuming we actually get them stateside, but I won’t hold my breath on that one. I coulodn’t even find a decent GIF for this one.

Crossing Time (6/10)

A fun, yet not especially memorable set of vignettes about people waiting for the train to go by. Some of the episodes were less enjoyable than others, but still worth a watch if only because it’ll only take you half an hour and anything you don’t like will probably be over quickly.

Golden Kamuy (6/10)

The last thing I finished for the season, Golden Kamuy’s failure to live up to high expectations lies in its inability to focus on its serious tone, constantly inserting dick jokes into its brutal fight scenes and dragging a poop joke on for entirely too long throughout the show, but it’s still good-looking enough to be worth watching, and it was the only decent show this season to pull out the announcement of a continuation in its last episode, without which it probably wouldn’t have gotten a pass from me.

Umamusume: Pretty Derby (7/10)

I still am amazed by the legwork that went into this silly little mobile game adaptation. While parts of it remain half-assed and unnecessary (the random idol performances being at the top of that list), it’s still a competently-written story about a protagonist who won’t let anything stop her from being The Very Best Like No One Ever Was, and I never get tired of that. The constant timeskips do get a little hard to keep track of, though.

Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku (7/10)

This one could have been improved by just tweaking a few things. While the characters were endearing and the comedy on-point, the story needed a little interference just so that we didn’t end the final episode in pretty much the same place as the second, because I didn’t get any sense of progress in the main relationship. Still, totally worth a watch if you were disappointed by the news that Recovery of an MMO Junkie was directed by a Nazi.

Comic Girls (7/10)

A very cute story of four artists living together and sharing their passion for manga. This one grew on me a lot over its run, and while I had been pretty certain it would be a 6, a satisfying ending and unnecessarily pretty production elevated it, and I’m glad I wound up finishing it.

Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online (8/10)

This one has the distinction of being the first review I got hate mail for, because I said that Sigsawa was a far better writer than Kawahara and that the female characters in Alternative actually had agency, and boy are those things true. As it turns out, without Kirito-sama, Sword Art Online can actually be decent, or even great. A solid buildup, well-defined characters (that don’t want to bang the main character!) and a spectacular climax lead up to the best story in the franchise. Can’t wait for Alicization to bring SAO crashing back down to mediocrity-at-best.

Tada-kun Never Falls in Love (8/10)

The only HIDIVE show I finished this season! And the best of three romantic comedies we got this spring, because it gave us the progression and satisfaction that Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun wasn’t able to. While it hit a few stumbling blocks, Tada-kun was brought up at least two full points by its fantastic ending, and that was a great surprise since I was really skeptical going into the final few episodes, as they are a big shift in tone and setting from the rest of the show, but the story pulled it off brilliantly.

Hinamatsuri (8/10)

The funniest show of the season, hands-down, Hinamatsuri is the strange tale of a girl with psychic powers from another dimension coming to live with her new yakuza dad, and the hilarity that ensues. Hina herself is a great character, as her dimwittedness is the basis for a lot of the comedy in this show, but the real heart is Anzu, and the coming-of-age journey she takes over the course of the story. This series shows a great and uncommon sympathy to the downtrodden members of Japanese society, and ultimately is able to bring every character’s arc to a meaningful and satisfying conclusion...except for one. Shame about that final episode.

Food Wars: The Third Plate (9/10)

I’m surprised at the lack of heat I’ve gotten about my opinion on Food Wars, and maybe it’s because I’ve been too subtle about my feelings, so I’ll spell them out clearly now: Food Wars is better than My Hero Academia, and you should be watching it.

Lostorage Conflated WIXOSS (9/10)

Man, was this a satisfying turnaround from the disappointment that was incited. The decision to bring the original cast back for a Massive Multiplayer Team-Up was a great one, and meant that almost every character, but especially Midoriko, got the conclusion they really needed. I’m hoping that this is the end for this franchise, if only so it can go out on its highest note. Oh, also, the soundtrack is still awesome.

Best of the Season:...

...

...

MEGALOBOX (10/10)

This shouldn’t surprise anyone, because MEGALOBOX was perfect from beginning to end and anybody who watched it is well aware of that fact. The sleeper hit of the season was everything the first episode promised; a gritty, 90′s-flavored story of one man’s journey to prove himself the best, and damn the consequences. MEGALOBOX is so great that it’s difficult to pick out individual elements of its awesomeness, but special mention should go to the music, because it is amazing. The OST of this one should go down in history along with that of Bebop as the best that anime has to offer.

[crimes-wears-goggles]

Digi is Musing About Portfolio Stuff: Help Plz??

Musing on my children’s illustration portfolio. Long post ahead, cut for the giant pile of images.I want three sections to my portfolio--

Watercolor:

Digital:

And inkwash, which I guess you could maybe argue should go into watercolor but I feel like they’re separate beasts:

And I think that would all be good. Since I’m aiming for children’s book work, I need to show a number of things: A consistent style, the ability to draw kids and animals, some good backgrounds, solid use of color... however, what I have here is the main stuff I currently have that I feel like showing. I have a few pieces I really like, but they don’t really fit with the styles I have up there:

And then there’s the work I have done on all four books I’ve illustrated. I have a few pieces from those that I am VERY proud of, but they aren’t entirely consistent with the style above. They range between pretty simple to complicated and kind of flawed in their complications, though I may be the only one who sees the flaws.

The only one of these I have permission to use right now for portfolio work is the guy in all the gold, Kublai Khan. I feel unsure if I should use these though? Like I do think these are legitimately good and I think I did good work considering I’m pumping these paintings out at a very quick pace. But I’m not sure if they’re good enough that a person would look at my work and hire me?

So I find myself wondering if I should just focus on developing a new portfolio. I have some time off between books right now and it might be best to take this time to really focus on making stronger work. I can’t be sure how long that will take though-- I certainly think I have better work in me, but I may be overestimating my abilities. Developing truly great art takes time and I keep worrying because I only have so many free weeks before the next book starts.

I have enough here that I could probably put this together on a website, start searching for jobs. Like if I just kept the more cartoony/watercolorish digital pieces, the ink pieces and all the watercolor stuff, I argubly have a cohesive children’s portfolio right there. I don’t think it’s perfect, but I could probably assemble that and start putting out feelers for other work.

Thing is, part of putting feelers out for other work includes putting together tearsheets and the like, and I’m... unsure that much of this is worth putting together and paying to physically print and send out. Like... if I were an art director, there are only a few pieces I would want in a book. Of course, I’m also my own worst critic, so... Idk??

I don’t know what I’m doing. Obviously. I’m not sure what I should focus on or spend this time doing. I think I should focus on tightening up my portfolio but I’m not sure what to keep and what to add. Hm.