#i only have one blu ray because I it was gift but i don't have a blu ray player :(

[poppyies]

I counted all my physical media for fun, I guess. Anyway here's the numbers if you're interested :D

Books (+comics) - 248

Games - 10 (I'm not much of a gamer)

Blu rays - 1

CDs - 10

DVDs - 66

[sunniedesi]

Future Diary Radio

One piece of Future Diary merch that's always kinda frustrated me are the "Future Diary Radio" CDs. Each of the three CDs came as a gift for pre-ordering the Blu-Ray limited editions of volumes 7, 8 and 9, respectively. The CDs are said to contain a radio segment of the characters featured on the covers talking about the state of the series (as of the respective volume each CD came in) their thoughts, feelings and futures, from their own POV. And that's about as much as we know from the Future Diary Radio...

Unlike the other CDs related to Future Diary, such as the Oyasumi and PSP wallpaper CDs, we don't have access to the contents of the Future Diary Radio online. No matter how much I look for it, nothing really comes up, just the images of the cover art for each CD, which honestly aren't very high quality either (not to mention they somehow managed to mess up the spelling of "diary" on the first cover lmao).

The part that truly frustrates me the most is that I'm unable to buy the CDs at the time, and the thought of them becoming lost media isn't that far-fetched given how long they've been out. I've been meaning to translate them for a while if I ever came across the audio (kinda like I did with the Oyasumi CDs), so if anyone reading this owns a copy of the CDs and is willing to share it online, I would really appreaciate it!

I know that the radio segments may not add much to the story, but my curiosity is winning me over. After all, I'd love to see what sort of conversations Yuno and Yukki have together about the show, and heck, Minene and Yomotsu? Don't even get me started on MurMur and Kousaka fighting. So yeah, I hope that one day we can see the contents of the radio come out. I would hate it if we're left with nothing but the bad quality pictures, like other merch from the past... not to mention the other random merch that we only know of because of promotional booklets, but I better end my rant here before I lose my mind over an MN mp3 player ;-;

[misscammiedawn]

Would you like to share any opinions on RUSH? You get extra points if they’re hot takes.

*HIGH PITCHED SQUEEEEEEEEEEE*!!!

Penny? I love you! Thank you for unleashing my thoughts!

VERY WELL! Let us begin!

I'm gonna list them in random order

- Time Stand Still is best music video and anyone who disagrees is being a grinch!

- Our favorite album is Roll the Bones and our favorite Live CD is A Show of Hands! I think Rush in Rio and Permanent Waves are the *best* though!

- They should just release the Different Stages live recording. It's pretty much out there as extra features on the other DVDs!

- The Clockwork Angels book and graphic novel are pretty average but are worth it for making Seven Cities of Gold not suck. The worst song is the best chapter of the novel

- I would buy a Blu-Ray that is just the backing videos for the live videos and I hate that the only backing vid that exists in full form is By-Tor from Rush in Rio (as an Easter Egg)

- Emotion Detector is the most underrated Rush song and I would have preferred Tom Sawyer or YYZ not get played in one of the tours to accommodate it in a concert! Only 44 songs have never been played live before and of them the only one that I think deserved to be played more is Vapor Trail because it is the ONLY title song of an album never played live (after Presto was pulled out for Time Machine)

- It is pronounced Why-Why-Zed. It is spelt Vapor Trails. The American spelling of Vapor is essential to the song's message

- Analog Kid is Alex's best song, Ghost of a Chance and Between The Wheels are second and third-- though live versions of Working Man are up there

- Geddy's solo at the end of Leave That Thing Alone (Time Machine Tour) is the exact peak of Rush, that was their highest point as a band!

- SARS Fest concert kinda sucked? Spirit of Radio with Paint It Black intro was amazing but the equipment was shot and they gave Alex a hot microphone. They also cut off the "encore" which just sucked. I am also a little salty that Rush were an opening band for the Stones *in Canada*.

- Tom Sawyer is overrated and they're not even Peart lyrics. Limelight and YYZ off of the same album are better.

- Neil's Ayn Rand period is a valid part of Rush history and provides so much extra context to The Garden. The same pen that wrote "begging hands and bleeding hearts will only cry out for more" ended his life with "the measure of a life is a measure of love and respect, the way you live and the gifts that you give, in the fullness of time it's the only return you can expect" - a man with a storied life as Neil with as much tragedy as he endured ended with him completely giving and loving in his heart when 35-40 years prior he wrote empathetically that "you don't get something for nothing"

- La Villa Strangiato is in my opinion not just the best instrumental but it is in contention for best Rush song period. I would never give it that title because it lacks Peart's lyrics and I find that people who say that have an irrational dislike of Geddy's voice... but it's still a valid take. Natural Science would get my all around best song badge. But best and favorite are not the same in my world and even still I mean *technically proficient* mixed with lyrics. I'll change my mind, likely. But that's my feeling right now.

- Geddy didn't get vocal training until before My Favorite Headache (2000) and Neil didn't get jazz drumming instruction until Burning For Buddy (1994). Both artists were just fine as they were but they perfected their arts and I prefer late era Rush because of that. The band never stopped evolving.

- I would have liked to have heard one of the solo album songs live (I Am The Spirit, Promise or My Favorite Headache) or have Bob and Doug do Take Off for a charity event like the South Park or Hawkings concerts last year. I *still* want that. Neil wasn't involved in the solo albums. It could still happen.

- I want a Jukebox Musical of Rush music so that The Body Electric isn't the only piece of fiction scored to Rush.

- Alex Lifeson could have been a comedian. He's one of the funniest humans on the planet.

- Peaceable Kingdom is better for having been the only song where lyrics were written after the music. Vapor Trail has amazing lyrics in general but I feel the limitation had positive impact and I wish Neil and the band did this practice more than once.

- Rush's improvised and last minute songs when they are running out of studio time are the best. Malignant Narcissism was the result of the album director seeing Geddy warming up with a vintage fretless bass and said "put that on the album" so they composed around the improvised riff, Force Ten was literally a last minute addition to Hold Your Fire. La Villa is said to have been recorded in a single take (I do not believe that legend as it wasn't in any of the biographies I have read). Rush just work best with limitations. They're a bunch of goofs and giving them a time limit makes them go into a Saitama style serious mode.

---

I could write tons more. But I'll call it there.

I like Rush.

A lot.

More than you think I do.

[blazehedgehog]

Thoughts on the Microsoft Third Party news?

I mean if Xbox is getting to be a big enough brand that people are raising questions of whether or not exclusivity means monopoly, then yeah, spreading more of your games out across multiple platforms makes legal sense.

More and more of the game industry is regrettably going to be moving in the direction of "account ecosystem" rather than hardware platform. Years ago there was talk about how one day there would be no Xbox or Playstation console, just an Xbox or Playstation App you launch on something like a Roku.

The final disgusting endpoint in all of this "no more sales, just service" drive. No discs, not even local data, just a monthly streaming subscription. Forever. No ownership, no ability to mod games, no way to play offline.

Even in the best case scenario, we're looking at a Netflix where you stream 90% of what you play and only "buy" the 10% of games you truly love.

The only thing that flies in the face of that is, like, Steam. The state of movie ownership is what it is because Netflix got there first. The streaming arm of Netflix is the entire reason the "Hollywood Streaming Industry" exists right now. It predates Prime Video, it predates Tubi, it predates everything.

Fewer people probably remember this, but the original premise of Hulu was to get TV networks signed on to simulcast their newest shows online, because none of them were doing that yet. "Netflix Instant" (the original name for Netflix streaming) even predates that. Hulu was trying to fill a need that Netflix could not because Netflix did not actually stream TV shows at first. Not even syndicated rerun stuff. It was just movies. Streaming Seinfeld or The Simpsons or The Office was just outright impossible.

Netflix got in there and shifted the direction of an entire industry, before borders had been staked out or consumers had built up substantial libraries they were protective of. So we went from VHS to DVD to Blu-ray to Streaming, where "Streaming" usually means a subscription service and not any form of ownership.

But that's not the case with games. Users expect backwards compatibility, they expect their libraries to carry forward, and in some cases people may own hundreds or even thousands of games in a digital library. I know on the Xbox 360, I own at least $200 worth of digital games, because I won a sweepstakes specifically for a $200 Xbox gift card. And my 19 year old Steam account will gladly tell the entire world I own over 1600 PC games.

That's just on Steam! Epic is still always giving away free games (200+), GOG is occasionally giving away free games and holding sales where you can get stuff for a couple bucks, etc. etc. etc. It's like the warehouse of mythical items from Indiana Jones over here.

People own gigantic libraries of digital games they expect to keep and willingly modify in perpetuity. It's a lot harder to push people to stream everything off the cloud as a result. It's why the big selling point for game streaming is "No downloads!" and it's why it's struggling to catch on. Sure, a 100gb+ game is huge, but if I take my download limiters off, it doesn't actually take that long. A 90 minute download for a 30+ hour game seems like a pretty fair exchange, all told.

But Microsoft is still going all-in on "account ecosystem." It's like, think of it this way: every game publisher is in a constant war to have the one big holiday game that everybody buys. And for guys like Microsoft, that one big game a year is their primary moneymaker. If they can get everyone to spend at least $60 on their game once a year, they stay in business.

Game Pass is $60 a year. They side step having to put out that holiday season's biggest game and get to say, "Well for the price of one game, you can get access to an entire library." It changes the perspective on so much of their business model. Suddenly they don't need the big flagship holiday blockbuster, they just need to get more people to pay for Game Pass.

And the ultimate end goal there is probably to get Game Pass in as many places as they can. There's already a PC Game Pass. If they can launch some version of Game Pass for Playstation? Game Pass for Switch? They'll do it. The Xbox almost doesn't matter anymore. The subscription and the ecosystem does. It's why Microsoft rebooted the Xbox app on PC a few years ago -- it used to be a "Companion App" for your console, but now the Xbox App on PC is where all of their PC gaming and Game Pass stuff lives. Xbox isn't hardware anymore, it's a service you subscribe to, and that's where the real money is. Especially considering what a gigantic money pit hardware is; I don't think Microsoft has ever, even once, turned a profit on Xbox hardware (and neither has Sony, as far as I know).

Get rid of the need for hardware and that $60/year looks even sweeter, doesn't it? Especially when you start to consider that something like Game Pass Ultimate is actually $180/year. If you can lure people in on the $60 but upsell them to the $180... well, gosh, that's almost the price of a whole new console every year, isn't it? That's a lot of constant cashflow without needing the years and years of deeply expensive research, development, and manufacturing.

Getting people to spend a console's worth of money on your service without actually needing the console itself is massively desirable. They'd be saving millions, if not billions of dollars while making millions more elsewhere. There's a chart out there some executive is drooling over where a line goes straight up by something like 900%.

The only problem is the whole consumer rights/ownership factor. Which I am not a fan of. I objectively refuse to support Game Pass for what it's obvious goals are. I will buy and own every game I want to play. No compromises. I will buy physical if space and money allows. I will not be bled dry by temporary access.

[starsbegantofall]

This last week I had off for my birthday and just enjoying the transition from winter to spring (well, as much as you can in global warming and unpredictable Texas weather) and flowers blooming and gatherings with loved ones in spite of the ongoing pandemmy. Sharing photos below in case anyone is nosy. Did I do any spring cleaning? No. But I sorted out my fabrics and sewed a casual lolita skirt so that's a step in the right direction at least lmao.

A few photos, but not too many because I am not in the business of sharing images or text with people with malicious intent who might be reading this tumblr and somehow have a use for blurry selfies and bad artwork and poor grammar.

First is all of the stuff I bought for my birthday (plus one gift from my friends, I don't have a lot of friends lol, so I buy myself gifts on behalf of everyone). Anime and game merch from Kinokuniya and Anime Yankii and Sentai Filmworks, books and blu-rays and CDs from Half Price Books, make up from Ulta and Sephora (repeated in the photos oops), went to a different Kinokuniya later and got more manga and game merch. Plus a bunch of treats and little drinks and eating at my favorite restaurants to get my birthday freebies!

I went to Meow Wolf in the mall with friends earlier this month, my first time visiting. It was crowded as expected but intriguing, I would visit another one when less crowded, although who knows when that will be lol.

And here are photos of a pink tulip blooming in my yard before it got attacked by rabbits, and some bluebonnets blooming late at the park where I tried to take selfies although they didn't turn out great, but I touched grass at least!

Lastly I went to another art market but different from the previous two markets today, and sewed a cute strawberry lolita skirt to wear from Joann fabrics cotton. The market ran out of freebies by the time I got there, so I shopped small artists I don't recognize, the best I can do for the economy these days. Haul photo later, you can always check this twitter thread if so interested in previous hauls from the past few years. https://twitter.com/atelierinsomnie/status/1768546857410506858

Here's the skirt, it's so simple, no pattern, the only innovation was adding a side pocket. It doesn't get its own blog post on my site, but I will probably make a post with my casual sewn projects later for archival purposes.

[on-stardust-wings]

Now that we art all here, let us recount the deeds of the day.

*puts on Crowley sunglasses*

So, I'm not living in one of the privileged countries that get to legally buy and listen to the new Good Omens Full Cast Audiobook. I have tried buying it the normal way, but it won't show up, or it disappears as soon as I log in or try paying something. I decided to give the Audible part of @fuckyeahgoodomens guide a try first, before coming up with own (and potentially worse) ideas.

I am also a gremlin child of the late 2000s internet, I live almost entirely on open source software, I avoid the likes of Microsoft, Google, Apple and Amazon as much as I can in my digital life, and I grew up enjoying TV shows and comics that did not sell in my country. I do not actually pirate things unless it can't be avoided, I'm happy for the creators to have my money, but I also hacked my Blu-Ray player into forgetting that region locking exists a week after getting it and I have tricked Amazon and Audible into selling me things that aren't for my backwater country before.

On a tangent, region locking is such stupid capitalist bullshit they do for digital content. If I want a hard copy of something in another language or from another country, I can usually buy one online. I can go to a website and buy a copy of a book from Australia or a CD from Brazil. I'll have to pay extra shipping probably, and possibly import tax, but that's the extent of the problem. I can also, technically, just travel somewhere and buy something that's only selling in this country. I don't have to give back a copy of a book I bought in the states when I cross European borders. That's not a thing.

In the same vein is the issue of DRM/copy protection. I understand it's purpose in preventing black market sales; I do not understand that I'm not legally allowed to have copies for my own personal perusal. If I bought a hardcover book, I own it and I can do whatever with it. I can draw in it. I can cut out pages I don't like. I can legally take that book and if I own a printer/copier, I can copy it page by page and have one real book in my living room and a stack of self-made paper copies on my nightstand. Short of selling the copies, all's fine. It's mine because I bought it. Same with CDs or suchlike. Turn the tracks on the CD into MP3s to put on my mobile player or in the car or whatever? Cut a track in half and listen to only the first half because I don't like the second part? Fine. It's mine. I bought it. I am not allowed to sell any copies, but for my own use, I can do with it whatever I like.

So, with this overall background and mindset, I logged into Audible.com instead of my local version, looking to pick a small fight with a multibillion dollar company and their idea of media rights and property.

And what does the multibillion dollar company do? It goes "Oh hey, you haven't been here for a while, do you want a free trial? Here, you can choose one free title, whatever you like."

I don't often listen to audiobooks, in fact, I only listen to audiobooks of favourite books I reread all the time anyway, so whenever I buy one, I immediately cancel my membership after buying the book I want, because there's no point in paying a monthly fee if I buy, like, one book per year. And instead of being mad at me for this, half the time I get offered gifts.

So, I log on, full of spite and looking for trouble, and am offered a gift instead.

Joke's on you, Amazon.

I still have to go through the 'set your credit card to US' thing described in the guide, but since I don't actually buy anything with this card, because I've been given a free book of my choice yay, I don't have to contest with any of the weird and scary messages some people get about their credit card info being fishy. I am now powered by spite as well as glee.

I manage to buy the book for my free credit. I get an email about my purchase.

That was easier than I thought.

I go to open the Audible app on my phone. The Audible app on my phone currently contains two books. None of them were bought in my own country (I think they're from the UK? But it's been a while so not sure). Its purchase history says this account never bought anything, because the account is registered to where I live, and I have indeed never bought a book there. (Look, I like books in other languages.)

The new Good Omens book does not show up. Not even after clearing the cache on the phone and refreshing everything.

The link in the email I got takes me to my country's audible website. The book cannot be found anywhere. I spent quite some time searching, too.

By now I'm back to being more spiteful than gleeful. I log back onto the Audible.com website, and whee, there it is in my previous purchases. I can listen to it in the browser (nice, but very impractical), and I can download it. Yay, download. (I also do not really like streaming things. Parts of that is the shitty internet connection in my parts, the rest of it is that sense of "I want to have a copy of it on my own hard drive".)

The downloaded file is .aax, Audible's own audio format, which is basically an MPEG-4 audio file encrypted with a 4-byte key that's unique to your account. 4-byte is super cheap in terms of encryption, so it's not very hard to get around. This is relevant information to this story because that's the next thing I did.

Could I have tried to somehow get my downloaded file into an official Audible app on my phone or computer to get it to play? Probably. Maybe. But here I was with the full file on my own hardware while also being just about done with All Things Amazon. If I want to burn this on CD or put on my MP3 player or my phone to listen to with a music player app of my choice, you can't stop me, Amazon.

Did you know that you can open your browser of choice, go to https://audible-converter.ml/ and drag and drop your .aax file into it, it'll spit out your activation bytes (that's the key to decrypt it with)? You can do that. You can then run it through a command line tool to decrypt it on your computer, or you can tell it to do so in the browser window (slower, but works on all platforms, just pick an output format of your choice and there ya go).

So, I now happen to have an unlocked MP3 of mildly dubious legality (I think it's illegal to strip the DRM, but as long as I'm not selling it *shrug*), for free.

I have that file because region locking exists and I was not able to easily purchase the thing I wanted in my own country. I would have given you money, Amazon. I would have been happy to. It was your own choice to make it a gift, and your own choice to refuse playing it on the regular players. But it was a pleasure doing business with you. Sincerely, fuck you.

PS: I'm off now to donate the money I didn't spend on the book to Alzheimer's Research. GNU Terry Pratchett.

Ciao. *takes off Crowley sunglasses*

[artificialqueens]

You Get What You Get and You Don't Throw a Fit (AAA Girls) - Sammy Indigo

A/N: I have yet to receive my Secret Santa gift this year, so fuck you, whoever got my name in the draw.

(The AAA girls decide to do a secret Santa. Naturally, this does not go as planned.)

It was Courtney’s idea for the triple A girls to do a Christmas secret Santa.

“I just think that it will be nice.” She said, flopping down onto Willam’s couch in his studio. “It’s pure coincidence that we’ll be spending Christmas day together. We didn’t plan being in L.A. all together, and it’ll be lovely to spend the day with you guys. To have presents to open from each other.”

Willam twisted his face into a grimace. “I guess.” He said. “But it’s so soon. Not enough time to shop.”

“Don’t be dramatic.” Alaska said. “You still have three weeks. That’s plenty of time to buy a loving and heartfelt gift for one of your best friends.”

“Yeah.” Courtney clapped. “And last time we did this, we bought two gifts for each other. But this time you only need to buy one because it’s a secret Santa!”

“I don’t think you can do secret Santa with three people.”

“Of course you can, Bill.” Courtney stood up and ran over to a shelf, moving scissors and a knife out of the way in search for some notebook paper. “I’ll write down our names and then we’ll pick them out of a hat.”

“But we’ll know who each other got. There’s only three of us picking. You’ll be able to work it out through a process of elimination.”

“It’s still fun, though.”

Alaska squeaked. “I’m excited. I love presents.”

“Me, too.” Willam said. “When they’re being given to me.”

“Well, you still get to open one.” Courtney said, walking back over to the couch with a legal pad and a lip liner. She began writing each of their names. “You got a hat?”

Willam frowned at her. “Are you using my lip liner to write on paper?”

Waving her hand without looking up, Courtney dismissed him. “It’s Kat Von D. It won’t be missed.”

“What colour, though.”

“Polio.” Courtney said.

Willam barked out a laugh. He reached behind him and pulled a ‘Make America Goth Again’ hat from a shelf. “Here. Put the names in here.”

The three queens sat around the hat. Alaska instructed them all to pick one, and read it to themselves.

“Huh.” Alaska said, reading the name. “Okay, then.” she folded up the paper again and put it in her pocket. “I’m so excited.”

Courtney grinned at her name. “This is going to be so fun. I bloody love Christmas.”

Crumpling up the paper and throwing it across the room in the direction of a potted plant, Willam turned to the other two. “So,” he said, “who did you get?”

“We can’t tell you.” Courtney said, affronted. “That’s not how it works.”

“Then, how does it work?”

“It’s secret Santa.” Alaska laughed. “You’re supposed to keep who you have a secret.”

“Well, that’s dumb. How am I supposed to tell the person who has me what I want?”

“You don’t.” Courtney said. “You just trust that they know you well enough to get you a good present.”

“But I don’t trust either of you. I know who has me, anyway. Told you secret Santa with three people wouldn’t work.”

Alaska smiled to herself, settling back into the couch. “This isn’t a great start for the triple A girls’ secret Santa.”

……………………………….

On the twenty third of December, Alaska awoke to a slew of texts from the other members of the girl group within their  ‘AAA Girls’ group chat.

Willam: does the present need to be wrapped?

Courtney: Yes! Obviously! It’s a present, Bill, of course you need to wrap it.

Willam: ok.

Courtney: Wrapped nicely, too!

Willam: ok.

Courtney: Not just in a gift bag with tissue paper. Wrapping paper. And a bow. And a bag.

Willam: ok.

Courtney: Are you even reading these messages? I feel like your ignoring me.

Willam: ok.

Courtney: WILLAM

Willam: ok.

Courtney: I HATE YOU

Willam: ok.

Willam: guys where can I buy wrapping paper from?

Courtney: Oh so you’re back to talking to me properly?

Willam: bitch this fucking gift gonna be wrapped in a Trader Joe’s bag if I don’t get wrapping paper

Courtney: Literally everywhere sells it. It’s Christmas

Willam: but where can I post-mate it from?

Courtney: Just go outside. Go shopping.

Willam: im busy

Courtney: Well so am I, and I managed it

Willam: good for you. you want a fucking award?

Courtney: Oh go fuck yourself.

Willam: fine

Courtney: FINE

Willam: don’t get capitalised with me, bitch. don’t try it.

Alaska: Oh my God. I’ll bring you some this afternoon. Just shut up. Both of you.

Willam: thank you alaska xxx

Courtney: Thanks Alaska :) xxx

………………………..

On Christmas day, the three of them arrived at Willam’s apartment, gift bags in hand, and bright smiles on their faces.

“Merry Christmas, guys.” Alaska said lifting her mimosa. “Cheers to a happy Christmas and a wonderful new year.”

Willam lifted his water, Courtney following suit with her mimosa. “Cheers.”

“Cheers.”

“So,” Courtney said, placing down her glass, “presents?”

“Ooh, yes!” Willam rubbed his hands together in excitement. “Give me mine. Give me mine. Who got me?” He grinned. “Alaska?” Willam wiggled his eyebrows at her.

“Well how about we exchange them all together? On the count of three?”

Alaska smiled. “Sounds like a plan.”

“Alright.” Courtney said. “After three, hand your present to who you picked. One, two, three.”

Willam and Courtney held a gift bag out to each other. They blinked at the other in confusion.

“What?” Willam said.

Courtney frowned. “But I thought-?”

Alaska sat with her bag in her lap, grinning broadly. “Oh, Alaska, thank you, you shouldn’t have.” She said. “You’re so welcome, Alaska, it was my pleasure.”

“Wait.” Willam said, staring at her. “You picked yourself?”

“Sure did.” She smiled. “A happy accident.”

Courtney pouted. “Alaska! Why didn’t you say anything? We would have drawn again. I thought you had me.”

“I thought you had me.” Willam said. “Fuck, Courtney had me? Now I know I’m getting something shitty.”

“Willam.” Courtney hit his arm. “I’m a good gift giver.”

Alaska tilted her hand in a ‘so-so’ motion. “I’m going to be honest with both of you. I love you very much, and you’re both my best friends, but neither one of you are that good at giving gifts.”

“I’m offended.”

Courtney glared at her. “Me, too. I’m great at presents.”

“If you say so.” Alaska shrugged. “But I got myself some wonderful things.” She pulled two gifts from her bag and began unwrapping them. “The Golden Girls box set on Blu-ray with three hours of behind the scenes and cast interviews? Alaska, how did you know?!”

Willam rolled his eyes. “Okay, calm down.”

Unwrapping the next gift, Alaska cheered. “And sunglasses with the new Pancha frames in polka dot? It’s like you read my mind.”

“Hang on a minute.” Courtney said, sitting up straighter next to Willam. “We’ve exchanged presents before. You liked the presents we got you last time for Christmas.”

Alaska put on her new glasses. “Actually, if you remember correctly, you gave me a wig out the trunk of your car, and you,” she lowered the glasses onto her nose to look at Willam, “got me earrings I couldn’t wear.”

“Those were great earrings!”

“And a fabulous wig.”

She pushed the glasses back up her face. “I’m grateful. I was very grateful for those gifts, but I was equally as grateful to pull my own name out of the hat. Forgive me for not having ample trust in your gift giving skills.”

“I’m offended.” Said Willam.

“Prove me wrong.” Alaska smiled. “Courtney, open your gift.”

 Courtney thanked Willam as she took the gift bag from him, and smiled upon realising he had in fact wrapped the gift inside, albeit in the same paper Alaska had used on hers. She unwrapped it, smiling at the flat blue box. She flipped it open.

“You’re fucking joking.” Courtney looked up to Willam. “Really?”

He smiled. “Do you like it?”

“It’s a necklace with your face on it.”

Alaska looked down at her box set. “Told you so.”

“It’s cool, right? I got it for free because it’s a merch prototype.”

“It’s your face, on a necklace.” Courtney said. “Willam, Alaska’s right. You are shit at giving gifts.”

His face fell. “That’s a great thing to receive.”

“Why would you think I’d want this?”

“Because I’m your favourite person in the whole goddamn world?”

“Who told you that?” Courtney asked, eying the necklace. “Who’s been lying to you?”

Willam huffed. “Well lemme see your gift.” He grabbed the bag. “Let’s see what shit you got me.” He ripped the paper off the box and opened it to reveal some hair. “Bitch, this is mine.”

Courtney shrugged. “It’s a symbol of a gift.”

“A symbol of a shitty gift.” He dropped the wig onto the coffee table. “You got me a wig that I already own? Bitch, did you take this out of my studio and just gift wrap it?”

“It’s a symbol of a gift.” Courtney argued. “You can have a new wig. You can pick any one you want.”

“Fine, I want a human twenty-two incher in a rooted platinum.”

“No.” Courtney said. “You can have one of the discontinues ones.”

���Fuck off. I don’t want a Marie.”

Alaska nodded. “No one wants a Marie.”

“Well, it’s that or nothing.” Courtney said. “You gave me your fucking merch as a present.”

“Many people would be grateful for that. It’s an early release.”

“Yeah and it’s going to be released early into the bin, very soon.”

“How dare you.”

Alaska laughed to herself, watching as the other two fought. “How about next year we just buy ourselves something and unwrap them together?” She looked back at her box set and pushed the glasses onto her head. “You guys want to watch the Golden Girls? I’m thinking we do season five, then circle back and watch from the beginning?” She sighed, happily. “I love Christmas.”

[arkadiaasks]

How easy/hard is it to get into, and keep up with, Granblue Fantasy? How expensive is it to get the character you want?

BBesides setting up an Account, which can be a little bit annoying, starting the game isn't too hard, and they basically give you free 10 Rolls for like a week or so as a new player, and once you pass the first few islands (or just press the skip the first arc or so since it's kinda weak), you can unlock Side Stories, which'll give you a ton of free characters, and a bunch of free weapons do basically fall into your lap early on enough to get started.

That said, the game tends to be a bit demanding on content, depending on how much you want to put in. Want to get a fully powered team with the best equipment for either Paying or F2P, you're going to need to sink a lot of money in (paying) or grind (F2P) against raid bosses.

Basically you need to do your dailies, and go after your current target raids to get the equipment you want which has the standard low rates.

Though to be fair to the game, CyGames for the early part does try to pace you, and make sure you don't run into a wall too hard, the only problem being is the lack of really good in-game guides of how to pace yourself on being F2P or P2W.

And as to the character you want? That depends who you're after. If you're after an Eternal like Seox or Threo, you basically need to get weapons from the every so often Dread Barrage or Unite & Fight and forge them up which are time sinks to complete, but they are technically free.

Evokers like Nier? Free, but time and resource sinks like the Eternals.

Sandalphon? You get his most basic form for free by reading Side Stories (which are permanently added story events, including few cross-overs with Bandai)

Characters like the main crew, Cagliostro or Narmaya? They have Grand (i.e. Special Banner Limited) versions you can get that you can guaranteed aim for at either mid month for one set or end of month for the other.

Now more recent characters like Tikoh? Not so easily guaranteed, unless you buy a 3000 Yen ticket that lets you pick the exact character you want, which comes around every so often but not that guaranteed, or you aim for that character on a banner for a Pity pick (known in the player base as Sparking because of the Cerulean Spark currency you build up)

How much does it cost with cold hard cash up front to Spark? 90,000 Yen. (about 900 US Dollars). The game gives you enough free currency to spark about I'd say 3 to 6 times a year depending how smart and lucky you are with rolls and when free roll campaigns start, which the big ones are typically like...

March (Anniversary of the Game's Launch)

Summer (August which is Summer Vacation for Japanese Kids)

Christmas and New Years (Basically gift giving periods)

But again, you can also purchase a ticket to directly grab who what you want (certain restrictions apply et al) I think from a set possible group, and if you pull enough repeat copies of SSR (Top Tier) weapons, you can use currency given with every repeat to purchase a special ticket that lets you buy whoever is on the banner along with special characters exclusive to corporate promotions or Blu-Rays et al.

But it is a game you can get pretty far into just being F2P.

I will warn however the game is about to remove the first 2 years of SSR Characters and Summons (March 2014 to March 2016), starting in March 2022, due to most of them being flat out power crept, and place them into what is called the Classic Gacha/Draw, a permanent independent banner you can build up on, and lord knows how they'll change free rolls with that thing in place.

And there's a bunch of popular characters who only appeared in that period in their original forms. Later released versions are literally later in their storylines, so.

[leoji-on-ice]

Hey there! Sorry to bother you - I'm trying to decide whether or not to buy Yuri On Ice dvds but I'm so confused, I don't understand Japanese and all the websites I checked are not very clear. You said in one of your posts that on amazon japan "The 7,020 yen one gives you a yuri on ice manga and other gifts if you order all six volumes", but what do you mean by "if you order all six volumes"? do I pay that price for all 6 and they get shipped to my house once they are all released? thanks xx

If you buy all 6 volumes of ones that say “全巻購入特典:「��保ミツロウ描き下ろしマン��(メーカー特典)」+「アニメ描き下ろしアクリルスタンド6セット」引換シリアルコード付,” there will be a code in your dvd or blu-ray. (You will get each DVD seperately.)  After you have all 6 codes, you go to a website and enter the codes, and then Amazon will ship the gifts to you. However, unfortunately this only apply to people who live in Japan. (they won’t ship it to you if you live outside of Japan because of the shipping fee and stuff) Other websites that sells yuri on ice DVD also says that they don’t ship the gifts abroad :(

In case anyone who is living in Japan is interested in the buying the DVD, here is the info about the gifts:

 When you buy all 6 volumes from the following stores (and it need to be the same store), you can get a manga done by Kubo sensei.

Some stores and websites like Amazon and Animate also have there own gifts, and they are different. You can find the info about these here.

Feel free you ask me if there is anything unclear :)