Review Anime : Tatakau Shisho: The Book of Bantorra

Well it’s been a long time since i’ve reviewed anything, even more an anime.

Let’s start with MAL synopsis :
http://cdn.myanimelist.net/images/anime/13/22769l.jpg

In a world where dead people turn into books and are stored in the Bantorra Library where anyone who reads a book can learn their past, Bantorra Library is maintained by Armed Librarians who wield psychic powers and their enemy is a religious society known as Sindeki Kyoudan.

Pretty short, but enough to summarize the background. May just add it occurs in a steampunk/fantasy universe. I didn’t read the manga, and this is the second time i watch it, but this time till the end.

I’ll keep it short on the art and audio part : the animation is nice, could be better; with a bit of cg but not to much like in some modern sci-fi anime, chara design is good on the overall, above the stardard, but still no that great. The audio part is the less remarkable part : musics don’t appeal and voicing/sounds are pretty standard. Its difficult to critisize on the voicing part, as Japan voice actors are really great in animation, aside from particular weird choices; but this isn’t the case here.

Let’s get into the most important part, scenario and background.

Until near the end, the everlasting fight between the librarians and the Church seems to be the main plot who link each arcs together, except the last one where the truth is revealed.
Books are in reality stone tablets who are collected when people die. The Library of Bantorra purpose is to acquire then store and protect those books. They are stored in different crypts/or labyrinths which are themselves protected by mythics beasts who attack on sight; which is why only “armed librarians” are allowed to manage the library. The Church purpose, seems more focused on creating a perfect happyness book, with the means of “True Men” and their underlings.

To be honest, the anime is nice to watch until the latest episodes, maybe above 20. At this point, the story gets more confusing, and the last arc ruined the anime. ( Don’t know if it’s the same story in the manga ).
I am also curious to know if like me, some people where in aw at the end of the first arc. I just couldn’t believe that Shiron/Colio were just ditched right on the next episode. Even if both of them are dead,even being supportive characters, and if we somehow get to see them again at the end, i am really dissapointed considering how great their love story is.
This was by far my favorite arc, the others didn’t gave such an impression; not that they were bad, but it was a continous stream till the last part. I still don’t understand how the end can be so bad. The author or producers made one the worst possible choice here.
The steampunk feel comes from coal mines used in some arcs,but also the presence of firearms,aircraft, battleships, and cars/tanks. The fantasy feel comes mainly from magic being used by ranked armed librarian and the church. There is ranking among theses orders, but the only one worth noticing are the Meats. Meats as they are called, are basically brainwashed humans which main purpose is to be used as human bombs against the Libarians. Some of them escape their fate and have their importance as support, for example Colio or Olivia. The result gives a good impression.

There is an important cast of characters, with their specific look, fighting style etc, and some of them are interesting : aside from Hamyuts, the crazy bigboobed director of the librarian, there is also the mysterious Mattalast and the ever caring Noloty. Some supportive characters are also worth noticing. Being action oriented, relations are mostly friendly, and where love doesn’t bloom, there’s no drama either. Yeah, there’re 3 noticeable couple, but aside from Hamy and Matt, nothing happens.

On the overall, i still got a good feeling while watching this, interessing background but if i were to recommend it, i’d said not to expect to be impressed, and to be prepared for a really poor end.

Internet has also its part of uglyness.

Internet, its freedom, it’s evergrowing size and content, its multibillion users and all the hype that is generated on it.
But as there are a lot of really nice things on the internet, there are also a lot of sad things that occurs thought or because of it.
This is the second time that i spent hours reading acticles on a particular case, and this one hurted me.
Basicaly, this is a blackmail/harass story with the worst possible ending.The video present that girl’s story. Her name was Amanda Todd. “Was” because she didn’t live throught it :( .

This is terrible, and really depressing, that a cute girl like her had her like destroyed and ended up commiting suicide despite her calls for someone to share the burden with. I think that like me, a lot of people would have rushed to hug her and relieved her of her suffering, if it has been physically possible. This is just too sad.

Unfortunately, this concur with one of the modern manking illness : While we have so many community/social hub, while the world have never had that many communication means/devices; humans have never felt this lonely.

But i keep my opinion : internet shall remain a place of Freedom, what has to be done is NOT controlling it. What must be done is sensibilize every generation, especialy the younger ones; of what the internet is and what you may encounter depending on what you do on it. This can be a really dangerous place, and everyone shall be aware of that and be prepared before opening a webrowser.

Diablo 3 : résumé de la soirée de lancement et review.

C’est une grosse série de suite que l’on a vu au cours des derniers mois : Battlefield 3, Deux Ex 3 , Mass Effect 3 , et il ya quelques jours, le petit dernier de Blizzard, Diablo 3.
Hélas, tous ces titres souffrent des maux introduient par l’industrie videoludique moderne. Les erreurs des uns se retrouvent petit à petit chez les autres. Heureusement, la scène indépendante est là pour rattraper tout cela.

Pour la petite histoire; je dois tout d’abord dire que je n’ai jamais été un fan de Diablo ni des hack & slash en général. Fps, Rts, Aventure et plateforme étaient quasi mes seuls genre sur PC il y a une dizaine d’année. C’est un voisin qui m’a initié au rpg sur PC alors que j’étais encore au collège. Et le premier jeu qu’il me preta n’était autre que Baldur’s Gate 1, un rpg certe légendaire, mais qui été trop complexe pour moi à l’époque pour vraiment l’apprécier. Toutefois, bien qu’ayant utilisé divers codes pour le finir, j’avais beaucoup aimé le background et l’histoire du jeu. Ce fut ensuite au tour d’Icewind Dale 1, qui ne me marqua pas; puis Planescape Torment qui ne dura que quelques heures, car on m’offrit à cette même periode un nouveau FPS : un certains Half Life. C’est quelques années plus tard, alors au Lycée, aprés avoir fini Baldur’s Gate 2, et fait mes armes sur Warcraft 3, que je découvris Diablo 2. Et ce fut sans appel, ce jeu était ennuyant. Si le gameplay était rapide et plutôt simple, basher du monstre pendant des heures sans vraiment comprendre l’histoire n’avais rien de fun. Sans intérêt pour le multiplayer, le premier playthrought se fit en paladin ( tant qu’à être original ) et se conclut par un down de Diablo. Baal ne connu pas le même sort, car lassé du jeu, l’extension Lord Of Destruction ne fut installé que quelques heures. Pour finir rangé dans sa boite. Je n’ai jamais vraiment compris cette engouement qu’il y a toujours eu autour de cette licence. Si je peux comprendre pour Warcraft et Starcraft; Diablo m’a depuis,toujours laissé perplexe.

Alors oui, c’est un genre de jeu qu’il faut bien dissocier du Rpg plus classique. Un genre batard héritant un peu du Rpg, de l’action; et limite du beat’em all si je puis dire. Ayant pratiqué chaque genre à peu prés au même moment, cet hybride ne laissa pas sa marque dans mon coeur de gamer.

Venons en au présent maintenant, 2012; où les voitures ne volent toujours pas, et où l’on meurs tous de maladies bizarres. Le 15 de ce mois ci, c’était la sortie mondiale de Diablo 3; mais par chance ( ou malchance ? ) j’étais sur Paris le 14 et disponible. J’ai donc branché mon ami Flax pour qu’on se retrouve sur les Champs-Elysee en fin d’aprés midi afin d’aller voir l’évenement organisé à la Fnac comme à chaque grande sortie de jeu. Vers 17h , déjà une énorme foule entassé dans des barrières spécialement aménagé. Plutôt qu’à faire la queue maintenant, avec le ventre vide, on part dans un autre coin de la capitale pour manger un bout. On revient peu aprés 19h; et là, je me rend enfin compte du reel engouement que sucite la sortie d’un jeu Blizzard. La queue dépasse désormais de loin les barrières, et continue sur une centaine de mêtres en direction de la place de l’etoile. Beaucoup de monde, des touristes curieux, des journalistes spécialisés, divers employés de Blizzard, quelques cosplayers, mais surtout; une armée de geek. Aprés avoir jeter un coup d’oeil, on se rend au bout de la queue, et on se retrouve avec ce que l’on croyait n’étre que des employés des Blizzard juste derrière nous. On les entendait parler anglais, mais c’est alors que l’un d’eux nous interpelle et nous présente en faite les deux personnalités qui doivent dédicacer les boites un peu plus tard : Alex Mayberry et Dave Adams. Si aucun des deux ne parlait Français, l’autre personne, dont j’ignore l’identité, devait être un employé de Blizzard France.

( Photo avec le Samsung Galaxy S2 au fait ).

A gauche Alex Mayberry, à droit Dave Adams. Au début j’étais dubitatif quand à leur identité, c’est alors que Mr Mayberry m’a sorti sa carte d’employé de Blizzard, ce qui n’a pas manqué de me faire rire. Toutefois, avec mes piètres performances en Anglais,  j’ai peur d’avoir été malpoli et rude envers ces deux personnes sans le vouloir; je m’en suis rendu compte aprés coup et aurais aimé pouvoir m’excuser. Toutefois, pas le temps, car le gong des 21h se rapprochaient et ils leur restaient beaucoup de choses à faire en cette soirée.   Quand à Flax et moi, eh bien ce n’est que vers 22h qu’on est enfin rentré dans la Fnac; il n’y a avait plus ni edition collector ni goodies disponible.  On s’y est pris trop tard pour consommer, mais au moins ce retard nous aura permis un moment de discussion que j’ai trouvé au final plus sympathique que la raison pour laquelle tout le monde avait fait la queue :
Une boite avec une décicace.  J’ai fais ca surtout par curiosité de l’evenement, mais vu la fatigue de l’attente et la mauvaise organisation; ce n’est pas si tôt que je le referai.

Et le sujet principal de ce post alors, qu’en est il hein ?  Eh oui, le jeu en lui même. Eh bien, j’ai du attendre le 20 pour pouvoir enfin y jouer, car je n’avais pas de pc de jeu sur Paris, et que l’installation s’est revelé hasardeuse à mon retour le 19. Ce qui a confirmé ce que j’avais entendu les jours précedents, tant au crash des serv de login le soir du llancement, que les divers bugs et plantages du jeu.

Eve online : try it if it’s not already done !

Eve online, a mmo in space by CCP Games, is in my opinion the best mmo available right now; and it has already been the case for a few years. A really cool community, amazing devs who are (finally ? :p) listening to that community, a huge content in huge galaxy, beautiful graphics. And well it’s about space, and spaceships.
Fanfest is a festival dedicated to CCP products, and this year edition will end in a few hours. This was the first time i watched it live, and it was incredibly fun. There were a lot of great stuff announced, and i am impatient to see it coming to the game.

I’ll write more about Eve Online itself someday; but as for now , just watch this video, and if you like what you see, go there and give a shot to the trial : .

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PsVita : To buy or not to buy ?

Yesterday, PsVita has been released Worldwide. 3 months after Japan, it is now available everywhere.
It features nice hardware, and is somehow compatible with old PSP games if you download them.

Owner of a Nintendo DSI,i have tried 3DS a lot of time without enjoying it. I didn’t go for PSP because Umd is terrible, and there are only a few Visual Novel in Europe. (WHO SAID EROGE ?!)
So it will be PsVita. Why ?
_ have enough of mario and already completed most of my games.
_ no 3D screen ! It’s useless on small devices, drain battery fast; and hurt your eyes far more than a normal screen. And i can’t see it anyway.
_ large screen = visual novel friendly !
_ better handling than 3DS
_ a potentialy huge database of game from the psp
_ unlike 3DS , Vita has a really nice design
_ others things i can’t remember !

Now, Vita is far from perfect. Battery life is average to low. If you want to listen music, buy yourself a pmp like a Cowon or something else, don’t use the Vita for this. Watching movies is alright, but it supports less codecs than some dedicated Pmp, and a Tablet or a Netbook perform better at this anyway.
The Console itself is really expensive, 250€ and 300€ for the Wifi or Wifi+3G version. It’s no wonder it still doesn’t sell well in Japan.
Games price range is fairly average, 20 to 50 €, which is standard among the gaming industry. It’s different for Psp games on Playstation store; for what i’ve ridden, it’s pricey as possible.
One other thing about Vita, is the lack of internal memory; which mean you can save nothing on the handset. Some games can be saved on their own card, but otherwise; you will have to stick with Sony’s brilliant idea : “Don’t Panic ! We have memory cards for you.”

Memory cards are the real bad taste joke from Sony. Instead of using standard Sd cards or Memory Stick, they’ve created a new proprietary format. Coming in four different size (4 to 32 GB), these small cards are priced far above your common brands. Knowing that there will be a lot of game to download, buying 16 or 32 GB with the console is logical. But it will cost you 60$ for a 16GB and double for a 32 GB. Seriously Sony ?
Game handset + a few games + memory cards + something to carry everything : we get close to 400$ or €. Considering what you can get if you go for Nintendo’s 3DS, 3DS is the right choice if you’re just looking for a mobile console. What may influence your choice would be the games. Even if the Vita is high tech material; aside from gaming, most of the smartphones can do the same things nowadays. But if you’re still interested, it could be worth to wait and see if more great games make their way to the PsVita.For exemple, a portage of Dragon Quest 8 or a new Final Fantasy Tactics would be awesome.

I’ll wait until it become less expensive, or hope lady Luck will let me win it as a prize. But you can be sure i’ll get it eventually.
And you, will you buy it ?

Japan will have a space elevator by 2050

Sources :
http://gizmodo.com/5887210/japan-will-have-a-space-elevator-by-2050
http://newsonjapan.com/html/newsdesk/article/94854.php

I’d also like to be alive to see that. But they should improve the speed of those cars. or construct a few space hotels beforehand; because at 200kmph, it would take an entire week to reach the summit of the elevator. 1 Week
36000 km is a bit dangerous imo, there’re a lot of flying object like artificials satellites up there. Security will have to be high.

But seeing that made think that we may not be so far from “Planetes” !

Finally, i’ve spanked Alduin for the second time.

After 200 hours of play, i finally get to see that.

Yeah there’s still the dragon speech afterward but this is definitely the most impressive part of the main quest and one the best part of the game.  My thoughts on the TESV :

FUCKING INCREDIBLY AWESOME DRAGON BBQ.

This game is really addictive, and you can expect to spend hundred of hours to entirely complete it, which i was close to do if it weren’t for theses glitches.

What Skyrim lacks and should have.

_A multiplayer mode : this game would have been even more incredible with a party of friends.

_Big world events like armies of humans versus armies of dragon.

_Glitches making some quests impossible to complete.

Here’s some screenshots of the last 50 hours of the adventure.

Dragons tends to love roasted bandits for breakfast.

Wut ?  Should have taken dragon language lessons…

Is the lack of a human heart the main reason thoses guys are so strong ? They are a real pain in the ass at low level and without the proper equipement.

Did Chuck Norris change his name and became housecarl after retiring ?

Blackreach : perhaps the most original place in the game, but totally underused.

The kind of jaw dropping scenes you’ll see in Skyrim.

You like kickin’ giants flying lizards asses, engage yourself with the Blades !

 

Merry Hmas, and Hnew Year.

Because Hentai has been what i sought, and when i found it, i knew it would become a part of my life. That’s what it means to be an Otaku; well one can say otherwise because H is the “plus”, like the strawberry on a cake.Anyway there’s no right or wrong in worshipping a product done by perverts for perverts after all.
I’d also like to address my thanks to all the fanbase and volunteer workers (not sure if i can call’em that) of the otaku community. Specialy raw uploaders, scanlation and fansub teams but there’s a lot more people who’re making this possible. And Ofc mangakas. Really, thanks to all of you, very much.

So be it, Merry Hmas and Hnew year, let it be another one plenty of H, manga and animation of quality !

Image and video hosting by TinyPic

You’ll take some more MMO with your online sandwitch ?

Solo or multiplayer; I tried a lot of different games lately. But my hunger for fun didn’t even flinch a bit since early this year.
Battlefield Bad Company 2 and Starcraft 2 still have their places in my usual games.
Minecraft, which was real fun a few months ago, has become not so interesting. Partly because the staff of my previous server made a lot of mistakes, resulting in people desertion. And partly because there hasn’t been any real good update for a moment. And honestly, 1.9 will not bring that much incredible stuff, except return of snow biome.

I even paused Age of empire online, because my buddy no longer play it, and the strategy part of the game is boring as possible.

By the way,today is 18 october, which mean some nice Video Games will be released in a few days. Battlefield 3, Stronghold 3 and others… But except for being curious about BF3 ( after a few hours on the open beta ), there’s none which seems to have that incredibly additive multiplayer that i seek.

So reactivating World of Warcraft and Eve online wasn’t the best possible idea, specially when low on cash; but i was so hungry that i had to reativate both. With no interest for Pvp nor HL Pve,WOW will not last more than a month, if not 2 or 3 weeks. New server, new character and class, but still the same game. Blizzard, what is needed is not content, it’s a whole new game !
As for Eve, i shouldn’t have stopped my subscription in september, a few millions of sp would have been more than welcome on my main character. It seems CCP want to change their aim for Eve, after this summer drama which is for the best; if they do it.

To kill time, these good old mmog are welcome; at least until something amazingly new arise. If not,the mmo part of online gaming is doomed. Yeah Planetside 2 has been announced, but it’s gonna take years before we can actually play it…

Review : Bulletstorm et Brink

_Bulletstorm :

Review courte car il n’y a pas grand chose de spécial à dire sur ce jeu.
Un jeu découvert grâce au troll video Duty Call. Fps futuriste, qui se passe sur une autre planete à l’univers Post Apocalyptique (encore ?!). Scénario inintéressant et durée de vie assez courte. Multiplayer sans intérêt. Quelques bons points : les skillshots : cela consiste à tuer les ennemis de diverses façons pour gagner des points. Ces points permettent d’acheter munitions et améliorer d’armes dans les bornes que l’on trouve tout au long du jeu. Certains passage du jeu sont assez fun voir impressionnant.
La progression est linéaire du début à la fin. Graphiquement c’est sympathique, il y a des variations dans les environnements, et la modélisation des personnages est correcte. Quelques dialogue sont amusants. Une partie des musiques est bonne qualité, l’ost est à se procurer si on accroche.

Bulletstorm est un fps potable si vous avez 6 heures à tuer pour accomplir la campagne solo. Il ne faut pas chercher au delà de ca.

_Brink :

Testé rapidement sur Steam lors d’un Weekend gratuit.

Contexte futuriste post apocalyptique, où les rebelles combattent les autorités.
Un seul mode de disponible. Le concept, si il n’est pas innovant, reste original. Deux équipes s’affrontent dans des match d’Attaque/Defense d’objectifs. Un peu comme le mode Assault de Feu Unreal Tournament. Chaque carte accompli peut être perçu comme une avancé dans la “campagne”. L’objectif ultime des rebelles est de s’échapper de l’arche, les autorités veulent détruire les rebelles (ce n’est pas exactement ca en effet mais peu importe). Il y a souvent plusieurs route d’attaque possible, et il faut de l’organisation de chaque côté pour sortir vainqueur de la partie.

Graphiquement c’est correct, le plus marquant est le charadesign, qui est vraiment réussi. Les environnements sont par contre peu varié, les maps trop petites et beaucoup se déroulent en intérieur.
De surcrois, elles sont peu nombreuses, et au final, que ce soit en solo avec bots ou en multiplayer, on fait le tour du jeu en à peine quelques heures. Le système de progression du personnage est plutôt bon, on débloque de nouveaux vêtements, armes et module pour les diverses classes disponible. C’est le seul aspect qui fera passer un peu de temps sur le jeu si vous visez à avoir le meilleur équipement possible pour votre grunt.

Mal noté lors de sa sortie par les critiques, cette note est en effet mérité. Si le charadesign et le système de progression du personnage sont deux aspect bien sympathique de Brink, ce ne sont que des détails qui n’occulte point le vide que l’on ressent sur le reste. Un investissement à éviter.