#since theyre starting to get a bit samey

[generic-lab-assistant]

Last half of Series 2 of the first lady cats :3

[deltaengineering]

Winter Anime 2019 Part 4: That’s all, folks.

Over already? This is a pretty thin season with not a lot of shows, so it’s not that surprising that there’s not many good ones either. Still, a weak showing. Oh well, let’s get it over with. There were a few decent ones in the last batch.

Circlet Princess

What: Dimwitted schoolgirl is good at some vaguely defined virtual fighting sport, changes school based on it, finds out relevant club has been abolished. Forecast says: 5 member plot incoming.

❌ I think it’s already clear this show isn’t very ambitious, and not very well written either. A game adaptation at its laziest.

❌❌ Man, this girl is STUPID. What the hell.

❌ The rest of the cast are less stupid (which isn’t hard), but that just means they’re so forgettable they might as well not exist.

❌❌ It looks cheap, and by that I mean really really cheap. The character design is ISO standard anime and it’s mostly on model, but that’s as good as it gets. The animation just sucks. That’s a death sentence for an action/sports show with terrible characters.

Bermuda Triangle - Colorful Pastrale

What: Japanese Spongebob, as in cute mermaids. Doing things optional.

❌ To make this quick, this is almost exactly Pastel Memories, only every problem is just a little less extreme. It has fewer characters, it’s looking slightly better, there’s a tiny bit more going on, the setting is mildly more interesting. That still means it is:

❌❌ 1. A boring mess in which a handful of samey girls do nothing of much interest in a location that should be unique, but isn’t.

❌❌ 2. Conspicuously cheap. It even has the same sightline problems.

❌❌ 3. Featuring a character model sheet that is “off” even under the best circumstances. This time due to the very offputting decision to give everyone blobby triangular irises.

❌❌ Unlike Pastel Memories (which was an ad for a mobile game) this is an anime original, so it really has no excuse being this lame.

♎ I find it amusing that Pastel Palettes are providing the OP for an anime, and it’s not the one currently airing that they’re actually characters in.

Endro~!

What: Kiraralike comedy thing in a generic JRPG setting.

♎ Namori character designs, so it’s like Spyce in that it just seems like the Yuru Yuri cast cosplaying a genre. But hey, Namori character designs do look good.

❌ I’m not as done with generic JRPG settings as with generic isekai settings, but it’s still a real problem since the former is now a subset of the latter. Mildly making fun of it does not improve things much either.

✅ The tone is cutesy and pleasant. I find this much preferable to something like Mahoujin Guru Guru, which is pretty much the same thing but with abrasive, high-intensity slapstick instead.

✅ It’s backing that up with generally high-quality, agreeable pastel looks.

❌ Not being annoying is a start, but beyond that this seems very middle of the road and predictable. I don’t get much out of the genre “parody” and simply being cute is still not an unique selling point in anime.

Grimms Notes The Animation

What: Did someone say JRPG? This is a mobile one, vaguely based on fairy tales as the title implies.

✅ This universe runs on the idea that every NPC’s fate is controlled by a preset story they’re aware of. You could make a good story about that if you took it seriously. It even does that somewhat, but only to the degree that you’d expect from a throwaway sidequest in a moderately well-written JRPG.

❌ And the reason for that is that it has to make room for being a JRPG, of course. Read: It’s irritatingly mechanics- and combat-focused. Stuff like the characters changing form when in fights just seems overly complicated and adds nothing.

❌ Said combat looks competent, but not good enough to make up for detracting from what could have been an interesting setting. Merc Storia did this aspect far better (by usually not doing it at all).

❌ So it ends up being better than expected, but then that only amounts to a disappointment.

Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai / Kaguya-sama: Love Is War

What: Kaguya and Miyuki are in the student council of a prestigious school and HATE HATE HATE each other. Specifically, they hate the part where the other one won’t just finally admit their love.

✅ The joke here is that it’s operating on full intensity at all times, over the most simple matters. It’s pretty much Kaiji, only about dating - complete with hammy narrator. This is another one of those shows where I can’t say with certainty that it’s solid, but I had a blast during the first episode.

✅ Regarding Quintuplets, I made it clear that I love me some sparks in my romantic comedies. It doesn’t get much more explosive than this.

✅ The characters are comparable to Quints too: Smart scheming upstart vs. rich scheming ojou, with a simpleminded girl in the middle that ends up winning more often than not simply by not overdoing it.

✅ The visuals are just as over the top as the proceedings depicted. Occasionally a filter massacre, but mostly cool.

♎ The long-term viability of this show depend entirely on whether they can consistently come up with scenarios that work, which isn’t a given. Also, this is so intense it might become tiresome - I already felt some fatigue towards the end of the first episode. We’ll see, I guess.

Kakegurui ××

What: Some weirdos think they can crash the party at Hyakkaou with an intent to scare the daylights out of Yumeko and Midari, of all people. Let’s just say they were not as prepared as they thought.

✅ As you might have guessed by me watching the sequel, I liked Kakegurui. It has its problems, but if you’re down for some crazypants madness, this show delivers.

✅ This is one of the better episodes of it too, because it gets right into it and the game they play is dead simple. Kakegurui was never about smart moves or strong characters, so not having anything detract from our girls deriving the entirely wrong sort of pleasure from danger is a plus.

♎ Sadly, the OP is a step down (though still great) and the ED is simply an inferior, overcomplicated version of the magnificent original one. They seem to know this too, because they play the OP cut of Deal with the Devil in its entirety for a montage. The rest of the production is on par with the original though, so it’s fiiiine. Oh well.

❌ It got Netflix’d again and the subs situation is dire. Since this is one I actually like, I might have to wait for the official release.

Kouya no Kotobuki Hikoutai / The Magnificent Kotobuki

What: Piston-engined fighter plane pornography.

✅ This delivers where Girly Air Force failed: Close to zero exposition, the majority of the episode is just planes dogfighting with barely any talking either. And that part is executed really well. I think the plane startup sequence alone is as long as the total of Girly’s airtime.

✅ Guess what, it’s Tsutomu Mizushima, previously known for unbridled panzer (und girls) pornography, and boy can you tell. However, this cuts out a lot of GuP’s bullshit: A plane doesn’t have the cast of K-ON in it, it’s not over-the-top zany, and whatever this universe is, it can’t be as insipid as GuP’s. The classy milwank exists you guys, we found it.

✅✅ The music really helps here, sky pirates vs zeppelins just wouldn’t work without some classic swashbuckling orchestra background. Fat sound mixing on the dakka too. It’s great.

♎ Can’t really say much about the narrative because we kinda skipped that in this episode aside from the obvious, but Mizushima’s Shirobako collaborator Michiko Yokote is writing it, and that’s a good sign.

❌ Now we’re getting to the elephant in the room though: There’s no way the planes wouldn’t be CG in 2019, but the characters are CG too, and their animation is mediocre. Also, they did the KADO thing where they 2D-animated the side characters that aren’t important enough to model. This has the funny side effect that you can tell who’s going to die real soon by them looking better. It’s far from great, but probably a worthy tradeoff if the mechanical side is this extensive and also delivers.

✅ This is definitely not for everyone, since you have to have more than a casual appreciation for those magnificent girls in their flying machines. I do, though.

revisions

What: A chunk of Shibuya gets teleported to the dystopian future, local doomsday prepper gets handed a large robot because he’s special.

❌ A Goro Taniguchi joint being a poorly conceived scifi mess? Say it ain’t so! I especially dig the tryhard English jargon (mecha: “String Puppet”, monsters faction: “Revisions”, particular monster, I think?: “Civilian”, tacticool operetah: “Balancer”).

❌ Works very hard to characterize the main character, to the detriment of everyone else. A for effort, but you made an unlikeable asshole though.

❌ This is another full CG show, with the quality of the animation being curiously variable. Sometimes it’s well above average and sometimes it’s painful. There doesn’t seem to be much method to it.

✅ Tries to establish stakes by being mondo edgy and graphically murderizing some poor bystanders. It’s adorable.

❌ If you’re really jonesing for some mecha, you can watch all of this on Netflix right now. It’s not like you have any alte- wait, Egao no Daika has mecha too. Well there you go then. That’s a better show.

[sermacsteph]

Ooooh, that’d be quite cool on both accounts :D Hissing wastes usually gets left to the very end before I go fight corypheus, its my least favourite map (other then forbidden oasis) cos its hard to find where the side quest triggers are but yeah I think the Hissing Wastes is one you can leave out without it affect plot to much. Some parts of witcher 3 are like that and if you try and loot whilst in the city and the guards see you you can get knocked out so you have to try stealth loot which is great but Im also really bad at XD

Definitely, the amnesia thing was used on inky so I think it’d get samey if they used it again XD

I think I lactched on to him cos Elves and he had all this knowledge of Elves and I was brand new to the world (DAI was the first dragon age game I played XD). Tbf Estelle was pissed and 100% done not to mention in pain, so I like to think he’d want to stop solas but by showing him a different way things can be done XD

I’ve forgotten what the first dormant eluvian looked like tbh, may have to remember to have a look when i next play XD I have Estelle unconcious by the time Dorian and the others get to him (cos apparently Im mean >:3 and also I can’t imagine the pain having your arm disintegrate like that must be like and there could be blood loss too) so Dorian kinda panicks. Although now I’m considering on changing it cos apparently my brain can’t decide what route to take this fic XD (Estelle’s part was easiest to write, Dorian’s pov is proving difficult :P)

Oooooh I hadn’t thought of that :o but its very plausible and maaan that’s gonna hurt to watch T_T just the thought of inky trying to reason with solas but he manipulates them and boomf they’re stone and solas now has the rest of the anchor....

All my Estelle playthroughs have been that choice and I always end up leaving Alistair because I can’t bear the thought of upsetting Varric :( my house mate left Hawke behind in his playthrough and just Varric’s reaction ..... T_T Yeah, like with Dorian being a magister that could have major ripples in how your seen by allies and enemies 

Same, I’ve finally found all the tier 3 mage schematic upgrades (only took me seven playthroughs) so I always make sure he has the best equipment :3 (Im really bad at using dlc shematics early on in the game especially the encore staff because the healing buffs are useful!) Oooft yeah, I think Krem would probably have silent rage he doesn’t strike me as the shouting type 

Yup, I tried navigating it in the dark once it shifted to night instead of using fast travel points, the amount of times I fell off cliffs...  XD yeah that thing can get in a bin, I usually try and stand as far back as I can get and let the rest of the party deal with it whilst I lob antivan fire grenades. :o I never got that dialogue the one time I clicked the I may have already looked option! I get the first bit then something about the inquisitor falling to their doom :( 

Yeah, same, its taken me since lockdown began to be comfortable speaking up when on discord with my friendship group XD

I hadn’t considered that, but makes sense since tattoos anywhere can be painful nevermind on your face! But yeah, I could definitely see them trying to hide it so the other doesn’t worry. Like when theyre talking to Leliana, Josie and Cullen about it one of the lines is literally “I don’t know how long I have left, so I’m going to the delveraard whilst I can still fight” just the tired determination in his voice ... :( for me I think its just switch who I have in my party and seeing what happens XD

Yup, it feels so satisfying given this is the thanks theyre giving you for saving their asses twice! XD yup! and something like that wouldn’t be easy to process (I know for me it was hard to process when I started depending on my walking stick more so lord knows how hard it must be when you’ve lost half your arm)

I kinda want my warden and alistair to survive and either become king and queen, or both become wardens and be this awesome kickass duo :3 same for Estelle I think, theres sure a lot that happens that they’re gonna need to process!

So after my xbox foiled my attempts to re-play Origins, I'm forcing myself to learn how to play on the laptop. I cant play for too long as my hands cramp up easily and begin to hurt, so I've been doing two hr stints after work

My warden is a warrior this playthrough (i normally play as a mage) and I've just reached the part with the ogre in the tower - this is gonna be interesting since I've yet to get the hang of combat. (I figured out how tactics work so that's a start)