Anime Surrealism

2 years 6 months ago

"OMG... no plot, no structure? you better watch this one again. ^^
This Anime is one of the first masterpieces of mamoru oshii and contains most of his ideas which he has developed further in his newer works like e.g. ghost in the shell (identification process; many scenes are remade in this one from angel's egg) or jin roh.
For sure there IS a story which is quite complex. It is hard to uncover, but thats the interesting aspect of angels egg. You have to be familiar with religious symbols, bible passages and the story of Jesus Christ to understand whats going on. I will not take your fun of understanding, but here are some hints:

- The loney soldier is a symbol of jesus. Watch his hands and his stuff he's carrying.
- This island is meant as the ark. Watch the shape at the end.
- this special fish (search for the type) was a secret symbol for Christianity when it was illegal.

If you like this type, watch out for the other stuff from mamoru oshii. he tries often to put in a deeper meaning, even though the newer ones have a "normal" story too."
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Losing your video game spirit

2 years 8 months ago

"I think this is a common phenomenon nowaday. I have already lost my interest in PC gaming, which was my hobby for about 7 years. I playing less videogames too... only sometimes some rare games which i get addicted to (for me manily nintendo). This is a problem of the industry of today i would think. The gaming-industry had grown from a perfect freak hobby to anonther big commercialized part of daily multimedia. Games are very expensive in production, so nobody risks thier profit. This leads to these problems which are imho the cause of the general disinterest:
- to guarantee your sold-statistic, you have to make something similar to existing profitable products
- to attact people, you have to make it shiny and conform to massmarkets taste (but make it fun and worthwhile ist too expensive)
- facts matter, because no one can advertise with immeasurable things like personal enjoyment
- unapproved things, ideas, concepts, characters are BAD, because the massmarket is unaware of it, so you won't sell it
etc.

I think this whole industy is dying or ... will crash like in the era of atari. It's almost the same. Hundreds of games are coming out ... but they are the same shooter (most suitable WWII) or rpg or rts only different in some details and OF COURSE graphics.

You can read MANY articles about this problem lately. (i read this one yesterday: http://www.gamespot.com/pages/news/story.php?sid=6141519)
I read forum-posts about bored gamers every day. Thats the reason why Nintendo DS sales are skyrocketing... mainly because its something different.

Its not the video game spirit... this whole overcommercialized and standardized industriy is dying."
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Evangelion is the greatest!

2 years 8 months ago

"

A good anime, but not the better, I thing this is the most over-rated anime of all the time...

But why...?

Even if you dislike the story and can't get along with deeper meanings, this Anime was an advancement at it's time.
It's has pushed forward mecha-animation sytle and quality (which was only topped by expensive movies like Ghost in the Shell) and differ from most standardized tv-animes in 1995. It attracted a lot people because of the possibility to identify well with the characters (and has an interesting story at least imho). Because of this, evangelion is often referred in other shows. It is simply a landmark which is an orientation (or a invitation to copy) for others. AND... it's a piece of modern art, not only because of the fact that opinions vary (inculding yours) on this one and it could be interpreted in many ways.

So, what are your reasons then? ^^"
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Favorite Super Nintendo Game

2 years 8 months ago

"Of course it's Super Metroid! It's perfect at gameplay and has a great atmosphere (even today). "
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Neon Genesis Evangelion 25-26

2 years 8 months ago

"Yeah, they are alternate endings and EoE ist the bad one imho, 'cause Shinji is running away again (he is afraid of the feelings of others he is exposed to in the sea of LCL) even from the HIP choosing a empty world.

There are even more endingversions on the paper which are mainly differ in the last minutes of the film. The real world sequence was supposed to be waaay longer than in the film, too."
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Neon Genesis Evangelion 25-26

2 years 8 months ago

"The ending is (imho) not about choosing reality's or finish this "overlay"story with Angels, HIP and such...maybe only that the two eps are meant as execution of the HIP.

The last two episodes are supposed to think about yourself. The characters think about their life, their problems (the "shadows of soul/psyche"), their wishes etc. ... and sum up the psychological background, which was build up in the episodes before. The whole series was about watching people dealing with serious personal and psychological problems... or more likely NOT dealing with them and running away, only to see that this will lead into even more problems. Slowly you can see behind the curtain of smiling and offensive Asuka, nimble-witted Misato, i-do-not-care Rei etc. covering many problems the viewer can identify with.

In the last two eps the characters slowly stop to run away. Thats the right moment you can think about yourself (if you havn't already while watching the series) and you own suppressed problems. At the end at least Shinji realises his own psychological barrier which was a social one (a.k.a. AT-field ^^) and begin to break down his social isolation.

This is a very personal experience depending on everyones own identification with the variety of personal attributes and problems. Since i'm a Shinji/Rei-personality, the ending with Shinji's realisation was even more impressive to me.

It's noticeable, that Hideaki Anno was dealing with a intense depression himself while making this one. Maybe this was his way to overcome the depression and show his development in the end. "
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Beting games in record time

2 years 9 months ago

"@Warrior: There is a misunderstanding: It's NOT about buying a game only to finish it before the next day and throw it away. The gamers, who do speedruns absoluty love their games and play through it looking at every pixel of it. It's quasi the next level of detailwatching. To do a speed run you have to know nearly everything about the game, every path, every skript, every position of every damn blade of grass to opimize your way. It's about finding every extra and far beyond it."
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Beting games in record time

2 years 9 months ago

"Yes, there is a meaning in it. It's a very difficult challenge. It has started with games showing the finishing time like Resident Evil or Metroid. Beating these games in under 3 hours give you extras or at least a honor. Players want to beat Resident Evil even faster and some try to collect all items in Metroid in this short time, too. Of course it's impossible to do this on the first run (so no storyline missing here) or the second or the third...It's all about pushing your own skills to the max. Try watching the Super Metroid videos (the most popular speedrunning game i think). They doing moves and tricks which require months of practice. Maybe you could call it sport being the fastest player in the world.

Many other games are used for this nowadays and its very interesting to see the players at work. For example watching the extensive Fallout 2 finished only in minutes was just amazing."
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Evangelion is the greatest!

2 years 9 months ago

"IMHO: I've you all think that evangelion was about religion or mecha and that the ending is crap, you should maybe watch it again. Evangelion is all about psychology and this apostle vs. mecha story is only decorative. The religious symbols are more of Anno's fun and are only pointing in the right direction of meaning. It was imho ingenious to remove these elements from the last two episodes to clearly sum up the development of the characters which all represent one part of human psyche. Maybe it was made with lack of money, but i would think this was a fortune.

The film was only another ending (the bad one) out of Anno's "ending folder" (which contains some more), but with this fighting and symbolic overkill it's a more confusing one."
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Serial Experiments Lain

2 years 9 months ago

"Lain is about modern society in a very critical way. It's impossible to sum up this wide ocean of deeper meaings, but the headline is maybe "All people are conneted nowadays, can't avoid this, can't resist the influence and are only a replaceable particle in this world". Main character is Lain: outsider, fantast, intellectual, geek. She changes from noncomputerism to the master of the net.
It's also about the blur of reality, virtual worlds, dreams...and how modern informationtechnology had become indispensable to life. About speeded up flow of information, loss of personality, commercialisation, almost nonexistance of intimacy, ignorance, craving for sensation, otakuism... and so on.

Watching may be confusing, but can enrich the personal view of the world."
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Murphy´s Law

2 years 9 months ago

"Hhhmmm... I think the "original" law of Murphy is true indeed. It was like:
"If there's more than one way to do a job, and one of those ways will result in disaster, then somebody will do it that way."

well-fitting with Einsteins:
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity,and I'm not sure about the former." ^^"
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what anime you currently watching now?

2 years 9 months ago

"I am watching (if i have time, which i have not really) Honey & Clover, Tsukuyomi, Naru Taru and will maybe begin with Gundam Seed Destiny after these. But there are LOTS of series on my list from previous seasons (around 20)."
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What happened to tokyotosho?

2 years 9 months ago

"Tokyotosho chat says:

"Now talking in #tokyotosho
* Topic is 'Tokyo Toshokan - A BitTorrent Library for Japanese Media :: www.tokyotosho.com [down]::NOT a serving channel :: TT merely provides links to torrent files. We do not track or host any torrent files :: Server: DOWN, Please stop asking! ::Server will be back up in 24-48 hours, gomenasai!' "
"
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Nintendo Revo

2 years 9 months ago

"

Thats how Nintendo has been doing things for awhile now, adding the name of the console to the end of the game, kinda strange but an original idea.

But i will not be "Revolution" most likely, cause thats not the final name. Besides, they not following this "tradition" lately. What was the last game with the name-addtion? I think it has stopped since N64. "
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Most Meaningful Anime

2 years 9 months ago

"I think this is hard to decide, because the meaning is very personal impression (i've read lot's of opinions about evangelion being silly). For me it would be evangelion of course. But there are many others to:

Since Evangelion (analysing this masterpiece is sort of my hobby till this day) and Lain are already mentioned, the next candidate would be Mamoru Oshii and his works. Most of his films are very meaningful. Kôkaku kidôtai was one of the first animes i've seen (standard-tv-animes left unmentioned ^_~) and i didn't understand this one until the i've seen this 3 times -_-°. One of his first works was Tenshi no tamago, the most symbolic film ever. This one is damn hard to understand.

Beside these philosophical films, i would mention series like Hachimitsu to clover too. This one has no deeper religious or philosophical meaning, but contains a message about friendship, growing-up and life in general. Sometimes i like this type even more, because it would bring some new thoughts in normal life... aaaand the philosophical ones are often depressing by the way. ;)"
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Anyone played F.E.A.R.?

2 years 9 months ago

"Sorry, but i have a not-so-good opinion about F.E.A.R.. No offence. Imagine a imho in front of each sentence. ^^

It's a mystery to me how this game could get these high ratings. Games of this type are THE reason why i've stopped PC-gaming, why i read many "gah... most games suck. It's all the same, only graphics change"-postings and why the x-box 360 may fail.

This game has really no new idea or feature and especially some elements are even worse than in earlier games. Ok, lets start:

It seems that this game relies on graphics (but maybe its the story). Nah... i was expecting great graphics from this one, but ... it's only mediocre. yeah, shadows are neat and the playermodels may have a high polycount, unfortunately the rest is grey. Grey walls, grey corridors... uninspired (and sometimes washy) textures, blocky levels. Most of the time you are standing in the middle of a almost quadratic room (with some standardbrush-like desks with a pc or papers or laboratory equipment) which looks like the room before. I've seen this kind of repetition and monotone ambiance back in doom 3, but doom was more shiny. It seems F.E.A.R. is incapable of illustrating nature. HL2 had good graphics, but F.E.A.R. not really.

Which leads to a connected problem: leveldesign. Sorry, but it's miserable. There's a lack of variation AND tube-like levels are unacceptable for next-gen (its the same boring design they had back at the beginning of first person shooters). You're following a monorail which consists of standardized "office-blocks" or "lab-blocks" etc. connected with rooftops or corridors. There are a few spots, where the way splits up only to reunite two rooms ahead. The Level change always at spots where you can't go back and often in a idiotic way (like jumping down a floor or jump over unbreakable woodplates). HL1 did this task better some years ago. This office-/storagebuilding was just endless. My eyes hurt after countless hours of badly lit and mosty windowless monocolored corridors.

Maybe the effects, this game stands for, could do some entertainment... fear effects...
no. Maybe i've played too many horrorgames, but these effects are often predictable and dull. The biggest problem is the nonexistance of the could-get-hurt-fear. I KNOW from the beginning that all these funny happenings could'nt do anything. People which vanish... you can't reach them, you can't interact with them. And this little brat waiting for a glimpse far far away. Gah.. i'm not afraid of scary effects which always occur behind thick plexiglass or pictures/*huh*-effects i know far better from Silent Hill or sounds i've heard in Resident Evil many times. It's even worse that the game switches only very rarely to the "scary-mode", the rest is actionlike.

But the story couldnt improve the game either. Although this standard super soldier concept is rather uninspired, maybe the background of this omnipresent paranormal leader would be interesting. But after hearing infinite messages from answering machines or laptop uploads i don't want to know this anymore. These messages are some kind of reincarnation of countless textmessages which bored me back in Unreal 1.

Maybe the action is fun at least. Yes it is! Although this slowmo is grabbed right out of Max Payne it enhances the battle... for some hours. After some time the fights get monotonous and you could easyly perdict the actions of the stupid a.i.. The a.i. has always the same skript:
First order: Come to me - always! (If they would wait... let me think that the way is clear and attack me from behind... that would be cool ... but no -_-°)
Second order: If there are two ways - come from behind! (Lets move to a tube-like section to prevent this, not to mention i know this order too and can turn around *lol*)
Third order: If there is a railing or a window - JUMP! (Maybe it would be better to hide instead, cause i can easily shoot them while they are jumping through a window)
Fourth order: If there is a cupboardtrigger - overthrow the cupboard and hide!

I played this game until chapter 8 or so. Then i was bored of waiting for the point where the fun comes in.

If games like this one keep coming out, only warming-up game concepts of the last century, the gamemarket may crash again."
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Questions about the Resident Evil Game Series.

2 years 9 months ago

"1. if you want to go in order of the storyline, you have to start with RE Zero, but because RE 1 (or RE Remake for the NGC) was the first game there are some references in RE Zero which are quite hard to understand without RE 1. So my recommendation is:

RE Remake (beginning of the story)
RE Zero (Story of the supporting characters in RE 1 and some happenings before)
RE 2 (aftermath of RE 1)
RE 3 (plays at the same time as RE 2, but its better to know the RE 2 Story and some places which are reused)
RE Code Veronica (Follows directly after RE 2 Storyline)

RE 4 (play it after RE 2, cause Leon is in it.)

2. The PS2 Version has an additional "Sidegame" called Separate Ways, where you play as the supporting character some parts of the game in different ways. BUT the graphics are worse, so the game will loose some tension. There are no real lighteffects, which make the night in the rain or the castle pathetic. The textures are singlecolored, too (walls are only grey, wood is only brown etc. no variation like green moss on wood). Polygoncount is poor as well.

3. Maybe Barry Burton. Always helpful and has a colt to stop these annoying hunters from headcutting. ^^"
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what is the best game u have aver playd

2 years 9 months ago

"This is very hard to choose. Many games from the SNES era would deserve this title imho, but i pick ...
Super Metroid.
I play this one even today and have finished it infinite times.

If i have to choose for PC i would say: Transport Tycoon. This game is responsible for countless sleepless nights."
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My first wallpaper to be posted.

2 years 9 months ago

"I think the second version is best at the moment. The color seperates the front and back too much. The fade-into-eachother effect is gone. Imho you should try to do the opposite direction... remove color (from the laser swords). This would give the wall an almost technical/blueprint look. But you have to add something in the upper left to fill the empty space (maybe a technical profile or an internal view of the gundam if something of this kind exist).

Or you color the two Gundams second-in-the-row slightly like the backgroud, so that only the two frontmechas are pure white. This would fix the glued look of the front.

And ... are the frontgundams looking grainy or is this a compression-artefact."
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Tenjou Tenge

2 years 9 months ago

"Yeah, maybe because this is heavly based on the manga. I'm unaware of all these characters which seems all replaceable in the anime."
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GITS Wallpaper

2 years 9 months ago

"Oh nice. New GitS look... not cold as usual. I would use it, although ist a depessing one.^^

My complaints (but i don't have a clue of wallpaper-making... yet *lol*):

1. The skyline of the city seems misplaced, because the fluid an the sky are very similar, so its seems the they are fading into each other, but the skyline sepeate them abruptly (the bottom is too straigth and cut the picture in half). Furthermore the skyline seems floating above the ocean(?), cause there is no connection (like a reflection or extensions like a harbor etc.). This looks especially weird together with the front, where Motoko (?) is kneeing in obviously shallow water.

2. The sky (is this the sketch effekt?) looks rainy, because all the diffuse lines are in the same direction. Because of the clear moon and the fact that its not raining in the foreground this looks a little weird.

3. The water waves around her arm (only one?) and her breasts are too sharp (imho)."
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Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

2 years 9 months ago

"

... Wonder if this game will work on Nintendo revolution because don't really know if I wanna buy a console for just 2 games.

Yeah, they make the revolution fully compatible to all NGC game (as far as i know).

I'm happy, that the game is delayed ^^(sorry):

1. I have absolutly NO time atm. Paper Mario (bougth some months ago) is even untouched and wants attention, too. Work and (sometimes *lol* ^^) animes eat up time completely.

2. They want Twiligth Princess to be perfect. When WW was developed, Nintendo and especially Miyamoto had a tight schedule, because three games have to be done to support the NGC (Mario Sunshine, WW, Mario Cart). Miyamoto and the development-team couldn't polish the game enough. Afterwards they admit, that some sections of WW are some kind of drawn-out, so they're not going to make the same mistake again."
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Tenjou Tenge

2 years 9 months ago

"Tenjou Tenge was... very boring. The first ep was good and the intro was funny, but... then the anime was more and more disapointing. The story change to a lengthy flashback with lots of absurd twists and (sorry) idiotic-superpower-beating-action ad infinitum. The end was finally the peak level of boredom, cause all the (minimal) tension (that they finally beat each other to death or something) vanished into vacuum: "Oh sorry, i'll give you back this shiny sword", "Okaaaay, lets beat up next time", the end... made this whole story useless.

Sorry, it was maybe not my taste. no offense. ^^"
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Are you Compatible with Rei Ayanami..? ^^

2 years 9 months ago

"OMG... my compatibility is 94%, so Rei is the result.

nah.. this was predictable. In Evangelion every character stands for a part of human personality. I could be everyone of them, but with more or less percentage. I know long before this test, that Rei and Shinji are my match.

If there is a Lain-test, i would have a high score, too. ^^
In the "which anime character would be your girlfriend" test my result was Lain. *yay*"
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Whats the saddest anime you've seen?

2 years 9 months ago

"The saddest anime i have seen was Saikano or Saishuuheiki Kanojo. Damn... it was hard not to cry. Meanigless war at its best. Second in the list is Ima, Soko ni Iru Boku, which reminds me of 2WW but give a look-out on future wars, too."
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