#might be the next artbook cover
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Wishes; Dreams
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Wishes; Dreams
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HGSN 25-3
Chapter (Japanese)
(Please hit the green thumbs up at the end of the chapter on the Japanese site to show the mangaka support)
Rough translation by me
P1
Rie: I...don't know if that will happen
Rie: But, it might improve things a bit...using a wrong sized lid is better than not having a cover at all.
(sfx: tick tock tick tock)
Rie: However, it's not a solution to the fundamental issue...
Rie: And, it's not like there couldn't be other...
P2
Hikaru: I'm totally fine
Hikaru: I'm a monster after all, so something like this is... ...
Hikaru: ....*sniff*... ...
Hikaru: ...I hate this...*sniff*...why...
Hikaru: Uu...I don't wanna be alone
Hikaru: ...*sniff* ...why...
Hikaru: Uu...Uuu...Yoshiki...
Hikaru: Uu...
P3
(sfx: rain)
(sfx: page flip...)
Yoshiki: Anything's fine, I just need something that could be a hint...This one doesn't seem like it'll be useful
(book: Regional Folktales)
Yoshiki: So if I summarize where we've ended up...
(sfx: pencil click)
P4
(txt:
"Unuki-san" worship begins
↓
Becomes "Nounuki-sama"='Hikaru' worship
* Local religion originating from difficulty living
* God that grants wishes if heads are offered
* The offered head disappears, a replacement is made and memorialized in the "Hall"
* In order to separate and bury the sacrifice's body parts as far apart as possible, the village was split
↓
"Mass Death" Incident (1749)
* Brought about by the Indou family's ancestor
* Excessive wish→Wife's resurrection
* Afterwards the village became peaceful
* From then on, there is a custom where the Indou men use "Hichi-san" in a ritual on the mountain
)
Yoshiki: The sin of the Indou family was...that he sacrificed the villagers outside of the family to resurrect his wife
Yoshiki: As a result, the mass deaths occured.
Yoshiki: The truth of the mass deaths wasn't death by famine but bizarre deaths...
Yoshiki: With that, the villagers must have thought that Nounuki-sama had become a tatarigami
(Hikaru: Is being dead and being alive that different?)
P5
Yoshiki: ...
Yoshiki: The reason the village stablized afterwards is probably because the amount of impurities decreased, right?...
Yoshiki: But, it's strange
Yoshiki: While Nounuki-sama = 'Hikaru' is on the mountain, the impurities should gather on the mountain and the village should be fine. What was happening before the mass deaths?
Yoshiki: And another question is the part where
Yoshiki: up until the mass deaths, "even if you offered a head, nothing actually happened"
Yoshiki: Why was it only at the time of the mass deaths that a wish got granted?
P6
(sfx: office chair squeaks)
Yoshiki: *sighs*
Yoshiki: In the first place, we don't know why there's so many impurities in this area...
Yoshiki: If we don't know that, then in the end...
Hikaru: Yoshiki
Hikaru: I'll go back to the mountain haha
Yoshiki: Anything but that. No way.
(sfx: fwh-fwhump)
P7
(book: Rafanelli Art Collection)
Yoshiki: An artbook ...
(sfx: flip...)
Emanuele Rafanelli
Renaissance painter
Died 1520
Yoshiki: Beautiful art...
(title: Girl With Veil)
Yoshiki: And here's the pages with rough sketches?
(sfx: flip...)
Yoshiki: ...hm?
P8
Yoshiki: This is...
P9
Hikaru: ...*sniff*...
Hikaru: ........
Rie: 'Hikaru'-kun...
Rie: (I'm sure it hasn't even been a year since he came into this world)
Rie: (For a child like that, this is just too cruel...Just for a little while, maybe we could let things be...)
"That softness will invite greater misfortune..."
Rie: (I can't make him disappear, but...)
P10
Rie: (With 'Hikaru' as he is right now)
Rie: (I might be able to tear him from that body)
Rie: (If the alternative is making him suffer, then for Yoshiki's sake as well)
Rie: (It's better that I take full responsibility)
Rie: (and deal with 'Hikaru'-kun...)
==
Next chapter: in 3 weeks
Twitter Extra (link):
If he'd been a glutton
Hikaru: I don't wanna be alone...
==
The other legible book titles on Dad's bookshelf:
* History of War
* How to Interact with Children~Recommendations for the Rebellious Age~
* Ecosystems of the Countryside
* How to Write Mystery
* How to Write Suspense
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Un-official masterpost for MOST (if not all) Splatoon 3 promotional artwork
Date last updated: August 26, 2023
NOTES:
I will update this as it the game's lifespan goes on OR I forget/get lazy, so forgive me if I do miss some pieces (feel free to link it to me or submit it to me). Although, if their official gallery does get updated, I will stop updating this post.
I will not include pieces from the artbook.
I will also not include isolated character stills (basically if it's just a characting standing still on a simple background) UNLESS it's put in a composition like the Return of the Mammalians piece where they're all together).
Lastly, I will not include 3D pieces UNLESS it's put into a composition (basically designed like a poster).
I will try to get most of these from official sources (so mostly either their JP Twitter account or news sources, but most likely just their Twitter because it's easier for me OR Inkpedia). These will be ordered (mostly) chronologically on when they were uploaded.
Section links:
[Part 1 Link]
[Splatfest promotional art link]
[Part 2 link]
PART 1
2021 Summer art
Return of the Mammalians promotional piece (horizontal source)
C-Side Album Cover art
2021 Halloween art
2021 Holidays art
Salmon Run: Next Wave promotional art (horizontal link)
Front Roe Album Cover art
Off The Hook World Tour outfits/DLC art (??? I don't know if that's what it is, I don't care there's so much artwork to sift through)
2022 Summer art
2022 October 9 Nintendo Music Live promotional art (horizontal link)
Splatoon 3 Countdown (Day 3) (Day 2) (Day 1) (Release day)
Salmon Run: Next Wave Big Run posters (I'm including this because I think it's neat)
2022 Holidays art (they missed Halloween...)
Splatoon 3 Japanese Artbook promotional art
2023 Fresh Season poster
Horrrorboros Sighting (I'm including this because I think it might easily get lost or forgotten)
Crusty Sean ft. Mr. Coco piece
Yoko & The Gold Bazookas Album Cover art
2023 Summer art
This concludes the Part 1 section, any future pieces will be linked to Part 2.
[Splatfest art pieces link]
[Part 2 link]
#splatoon 3#splatoon 3 artwork masterpost#masterpost#not my art#shoutout to seita inoue#this is a pain in the ass but itll be worth it for me in the end
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What is the book for? - part 3
Here we go, the next part of the investigation.
[here's an intro where I talk about the three hour video essay that inspired me to do this]
[here's the first part where I argue that there's a big difference between the actual thing you do in an RPG and the book that tells you how you're allegedly supposed to be doing it]
[here's the second part where I describe some of the purposes that RPG books claim to serve in the creation of the game, and make some comments on the storygames milieu]
First up a comment! @zendoe writes...
One thing I've only seen in Jenna Moran's books, though I'm sure exists elsewhere, is that the book itself is a piece of art that is entertaining or interesting or moving in its own right. Chuubo is very funny, I read Glitch basically cover to cover and cried when I got to the end, and Wisher Theurge Fatalist is arguably meant to be read much more than it is to be played.
You might even include games that are basically proofs-of-concept, hacks to prove you can put x setting into y system, etc. I'm sure a lot of games made in the heyday of /tg/ have never actually been played, and were basically just made on a lark
Tangentially, this is something that often gets to me when people moralize against strong "you must/cannot do x" language in a given rulebook. I would never deny that many designers have a gross "saving the players from themselves" mentality, but at the end of the day, the only part of play a designer actually has power over is the book itself. So (assuming they're not ABA freaks) why shouldn't they use strong language if that makes the book a more interesting product?
Love this comment. You're absolutely right, one of the purposes of an RPG-book can be to just be an objet d'art in itself (I say with maximum pretentiousness), using the format of 'RPG book' to guide you to imagine a game that might exist even if it's not practical to play.
For example @xrafstar and @ramheadedgirl made a great little zine-sized book called Blood Sugar: Sweet Ambition. I doubt I'll ever actually get to play this (but never say never...), and as written it's kind of a nebulous state where it suggests stats for a D&D-like game but leaves the details vague... but it's using the format of an RPG book with its stat blocks and illustrations to tell a compelling story and provide a frame for Alco's gorgeous illustrations.
A similar example (which @lapinaraofperdition told me about) exists in Vermis I, an OSR-milieu artbook which assumes the format of a manual for an old CRPG. There is no such CRPG but it's all about the vibes. The book's on to its eighth printing now so people are well into this kinda thing.
This leads me on to one other function of RPG books worth discussing. This tends to be less of an explicitly advertised thing, but I think it's a huge part of things - amateur-anthropologist hat on...
An excuse to make up a story together - RPG book as seal of permission
Suppose I got a group of people together who had never played a TTRPG, and asked them to come to my house every week to make up stories about vikings. I think most people would find this a rather strange idea, and it would be quite a hard sell.
Suppose I got a group of people together who have at least heard of the TTRPG subculture. I have a book which says Sagas of the Icelanders on it, which looks like someone has put a lot of effort into putting it together, and costs some money. I tell them it's a cool new indie game I heard about that I want to try. Even easier if it's a game they've heard about like D&D.
This sort of overlaps with the 'auteur experience' category in the previous post, but it's sort of aimed on a different level.
When I was a child, I would make up stories on every long car journey - before that, my parents would do the same. It's normal to tell stories to children, and for children to play and make up stories through that. Now, adult life still revolves around fictional storytelling to a huge degree: in just about every society on Earth, we put tremendous resources into making and displaying films, distributing books, putting on plays.
But in modern adult life in the countries I know about, making up a fictional story is a very individual activity, and very much tied to the dynamics of publishing. If you're writing a novel, it's expected that you might think of trying to sell it one day. It is something that you specialise in. If you're good enough, it can be your job.
Playing games also gets codified and locked down: you go and join a basketball club, say, in which you are expected to learn the rules of basketball. Or play a computer game, where the rules are set by the game binary, which packages it up with other elements like music and images.
Only a few contexts give you permission to just tell a story. For example, if you're sitting around a campfire telling ghost stories. Or if the story is framed as something that really happened (whether or not it did). A joke is the major one, relying on the promise of a punchline.
If you want to tell a longer, collaborative story... well, it's lucky that someone invented a hobby called 'tabletop roleplaying', with its attendant books, magazines, forums and other subcultural trappings. You can point to that and say, hey don't worry guys! It's a done thing!
I mentioned earlier the 'conceptual inertia' of D&D. All these trappings are part of that inertia, continually performing and reinforcing the idea that 'D&D is real'.
In this case, the function of the RPG book with its glossy cover and brand name and slightly corny introduction to roleplaying at the front - and notably, its price tag - is mostly a tool to unlock this special social context where you're allowed to pretend to be an elf without it being, like, weird.
You don't need a book for that, not remotely - roleplaying has taken place on forums, in chatrooms, in MUDs, in MMOs, etc. etc. for nearly as long as we've had TTRPGs - but it is a useful tool to help you unlock the door, as it were.
In this it seems (thanks @play-now-my-lord!) that I am following in the footsteps of Roger Callilois, who offered the following definition of 'play':
it is free, or not obligatory
it is separate from the routine of life, occupying its own time and space
it is uncertain, so that the results of play cannot be pre-determined and the player's initiative is involved
it is unproductive in that it creates no wealth, and ends as it begins economically speaking
it is governed by rules that suspend ordinary laws and behaviours and that must be followed by players
it involves imagined realities that may be set against 'real life'.
Nothing about that implies that it needs a book to define its special 'circle', but elements like a subculture and book do help to bring it into existence.
On that front, let's also mention...
A way to unify the subculture - RPG book as common reference
Let's go back to reproducibility. It's not just about having something to sell.
A friend mentions playing in 'a Curse of Strahd campaign'. Curse of Strahd is an official 'adventure' for first AD&D 2e and later D&D 5e. Like most 'adventures', the book acts as a reference for a series of places and characters, and instructions for how to use them, advice on how to create a horror atmosphere, and so on. Some areas are mapped in detail, others have brief prose descriptions.
If your group has played Curse of Strahd, it probably hasn't had the exact same experience as another group. Much of the book is open to interpretation in all the ways we discussed. But, there's a good chance that you have had some experiences in common. Much like you can talk about the different areas you encounter in a computer game, or the memorable scenes in a film, you can talk to someone else who played the same adventure. 'How did your group handle the mimic door?' 'Oh it ate the rogue and we all had to form a chain and pull her out.' (This didn't happen, I've never played this adventure.)
The same also goes for more general setting elements and the game itself. An RPG lore book is something you can become an expert in. RPG rules are something you can get skilled in manipulating. And even if two D&D games take place in totally different settings, you have enough shared context to be able to know what it means for a Beholder to show up.
This is just as true of story games as it is for trad games and OSR, just with different emphases. Wanna be an expert in something? Perhaps you know the Apocalypse World principles like the back of your hand so you can give advice on how to MC it, or always know the perfect indie game for anyone's taste. And since indie games are often quite specific, two people who played the same indie game are likely to have something to talk about. Or maybe you just like to have long theoretical discussions about game design principles (*sheepishly raises hand*).
You don't remotely have to strictly follow what's in the book to take advantage of this feature. Players will constantly be recommending house rules, arguing about balance, criticising and modifying the game. That's part of the fun.
As the first post discussed, the process of defining the subculture takes place outside of the books too. In conversations, blogs, webcomics, forums, we continually hash out what this hobby that brings us together actually is. But, given that everyone's group is different, 'we probably looked at the same book' is one of the few guarantees you can make when you meet someone and learn they're into a TTRPG. Small as it is, it's a powerful starting point.
So what do we do with all this?
Well, it kinda depends which hat we're wearing, right?
For a designer, the important point to bear in mind is that an RPG book is only a prompt. You're not a computer game dev - you can't really be an engineer of a precisely tuned system where all the moving parts work together in precise harmony. You're writing a message to someone else through a noisy channel, and to my mind, they get the larger creative role anyway.
And it's not just that they'll take what they like and discard what they don't - they'll probably forget things that you put in the book, or read things in a way you didn't intend, or get caught up in the moment and fall back on familiar habits. For their part, though, they're probably not even looking for you to tell them exactly what to do and how to do it, in detail.
I tend to find many of the best moments in RPGs don't involve any looking at rulebooks. You're caught up in the story you're telling! You're feeling that feedback loop of mutual inspiration! That's what I'm personally looking for - the thing in the book is just a runway to get us towards that point.
So what are they looking for?
One view is that your job is to give them what they can't easily provide themselves 'in the moment'. There's a good article from 2016 on an OSR blog Against The Wicked City that describes it this way: if you improvise, you will likely come up with something that is either painfully generic or overly wacky. An RPG book, by contrast, ought to give you something novel, which someone has taken the time to flesh out properly. For this reason, it must avoid cliché, because it's easy to spin clichés and you don't need a book for that.
In Vi Huntsman's video, they criticise Root: The RPG for acting rather like a dictionary, attempting to clarify the trigger condition for each 'move' (a rules-construct from Apocalypse World, more on that soon) with exhaustive, repetitive elaborations. This is a fascinating corruption to me, since it seems rather opposite the ethos of earlier story games, which would much rather give you something vague and cryptic and refuse to explain. (...OK, I'm having trouble finding really good examples of that, but I definitely recall one-page games that consisted mostly of lists of evocative names and phrases). The players can be relied on to provide interpretations of whatever a Frost Shepherd might be.
The challenge to me here is to create something that gives your player enough that it's there when you need it, but still doesn't feel closed-off and is amenable to putting their own spin on it. This is rather a matter of taste.
Prose goes
On another, more abstract level, the aim of an RPG book is the same as any art: to make people feel shit and see things in a new way. This is getting back to the territory of Zendoe's comment above.
So let's get into it: why is Apocalypse World memorable, when so many derivative games borrow most of its mechanics and yet end up forgettable? Why would I love to play Chuubo's Marvellous Wish-Granting Engine even though I don't really understand how it works at all? Why do I still think about what Unknown Armies has to say about fighting? Why do I find most of Avery Alder's games offputting even if the design is novel and interesting? (y'know, beyond personal reasons that she was a cunt to my friends.)
If a TTRPG book is a device to conjure up a usable idea of 'the game' in your mind, the experience of reading it becomes really important. A huge part of what makes those games come alive in your head is that their authors can really write.
But it's not enough to just make a book that reads well, is it? The player needs the confidence to extemporise in the vein indicated by the book.
Jenna Moran's games fascinate me - but they're also rather intimidating. Her books are full of quirky asides and little jokes and stylistic flourishes. How do you play a game in a Jenna Moran way? I think if I got a suitable on-ramp like an existing group I could get up to speed, but it's definitely the kind of game which really highlights the complicated relationship between book and game to me. Which is to say I have the book but I don't feel like I could run this thing, and while I could closely read it cover to cover and rotate its ideas in my head, it would be way more helpful to join someone else's game and see how they do it.
On the other hand, Apocalypse World adopts a very conversational style of prose. It asks you to 'barf forth apocalyptica', it titles chapters things like 'advanced fuckery' and suggests you motivate NPCs with their 'clits and dicks'. It rather obtusely introduces the idea of 'moves' with 'to do it, do it' - meaning that you invoke the rules text iff a condition is met in the fiction of the game. It's stupid but in a really fun way. Apocalypse World the book has the feeling of someone sitting down with you and enthusiastically explaining the game.
Nobody taught me to play Apocalypse World - I read about it online (on the story games forums maybe?), which instilled an idea of 'what Apocalypse World looks like', got the book, liked what I saw; I ran it based on my interpretation of the book and what I'd seen online. On some level the whole process 'worked': a game was, perhaps imperfectly, reproduced in another group of people.
Something about Apocalypse World, then, got me feeling 'yeah I could do this!'. But did that have to be a game with a name and such? Could Vincent and Meguey had written the MC chapter of Apocalypse World as a series of blog posts giving system-agnostic GM advice? Perhaps, but I doubt it would have led to a whole breakout movement in the same way. It's useful to have a name to anchor things to. (Of course, there's more to Apocalypse World than that, like the whole 'moves' system which dovetails with its specified approach to GMing.)
I once ran a different PbtA game called Night Witches, about a real all-female unit of Soviet aeroplane pilots who fought in the second world war. It was a great premise for a game and was solidly designed as PbtA games go. Where I stumbled was the ability to improvise - usually something I enjoy a lot, but here I felt an urge to try and achieve historical fidelity on questions like 'what does a Soviet airwoman eat' and 'what's a plausible name for a nearby airfield' (I fucking looked at maps! such a fool). I don't speak Russian, so I would draw a blank when coming up with a name.
Clearly I should have dispensed with being historical here - it's not expected, not like my players knew better. But equally, this is where a longer list of concrete bits of random 'life in the USSR air force' flavour info would have been quite useful. The game gives you a reasonable amount of historical info, but I still felt out of my depth. Fantasy is much easier!
Running a game requires you to project a lot of confidence. You don't have to say you know all the answers, indeed I quite like to make my reasoning at least a little explicit - 'oh! what if we have this happen..?' - but you are setting the tone for the game. Confidence and enthusiasm will vary with each player to encounter the book and the experiences they bring, and it's often beyond the designer's control, but you can definitely frame your game in a way that's more or less amenable to picking up and running with it.
In the next post... a few options, hmm. We could examine the idea of 'moves' in Apocalypse World more closely - they're a bundle of a few different things, and perhaps we should evaluate how well that works, and what makes for a good move-based system. Or maybe we could revisit some of my previous game design efforts, like the RPG duels post - did I go astray?
#roleplaying games#ttrpg#tabletop roleplaying#story games#i'll collate this series on canmom.art for easier reading soon
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Megaman Production Art Scan of the Day #808:
Shingo Adachi's Story of Meteor Artbook: Front and Back Covers
Finally, this now closes the book on my first sorta attempt at a full scanlation of something. Yes, it's been posted online by many others over the years in some form, but I tried to make my attempt at it as clean and nice as possible, due to how much I adore this art.
15 years after it first came out, I was personally just learning what was actually said in it myself for the first time, so hopefully I did it some justice. Thanks for being patient with it over the last 2 and a half months.
For those who don't save my stuff daily (how dare you not! ;p), I guess I'll make a zip available of it as well, for your convenience. You can get that here. (746 MB)
As I alluded to last week, going to take another short hiatus from Scan of the Day posts so that I can fully focus on Secret Santa art. Whether I'm back before Christmas or not depends on how well I do on that with my free time. Otherwise, I should be back posting at the end of December.
Already have scans started, but I will be diving into storyboards from Axess Ep. 6 (The Most Dangerous Ball Game!) next. Let's Bowling! Because I have the whole episode for this one, that is a lot of pages. Also, the storyboard art is not as detailed this time around. So I might do 2 pages a day or more, just to speed through it a bit faster. Otherwise, it would be 4 months worth, if I do a page a day. ^^; We shall see.
Full Resolution Scans:
(Front): https://imgbox.com/sdiU5vLF
(Back): https://imgbox.com/uEN4XXdN
#Megaman Production Art Scan of the Day#Rockman#Megaman#Mega Man#Ryuusei no Rockman#Megaman Star Force#Shooting Star Rockman#Shingo Adachi#Story of Meteor#Doujinshi#Miyabi Scans Stuff#Hoshikawa Subaru#Geo Stelar#Misora Hibiki#Sonia Strumm#Shirogane Luna#Luna Platz
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Still one dlc char to be announced in 2023, when do you think it'll happen?
According to the timestamp on this ask, you sent this like literal hours before the new Developer Backyard dropped and answered your question haha December!
Link to the post: https://www.guiltygear.com/ggst/en/news/post-2013/
Relevant text from the DB:
The next update is coming up in December 2023.
In addition to a new character, this update will introduce the second round of new special moves, this time for 2
characters.
There's also a small-scale balance update in store, focused on adjustments to the new mechanics Wild Assault and
Deflect Shield. This will include the aforementioned changes to input options for some characters' new moves such
as Giovanna's Chave as well as fixes for issues.
In the Q&A section they teased the possibility of a future artbook that collects all the works between Xrd to now. Fingers crossed it happens!!
The other Q&A responses said that they would consider putting in a way to toggle things like Jack-O's mask and Sin's eyepatch (?!) like how you can toggle Johnny's beard or between the two Asukas, though they said they can't promise anything. They also said that they would like to hold a character palette contest OR survey some day and that they're looking into refining the input for Deflect Shield
The upcoming qualifier tournaments for Arc World Tour are: FIGHTERS SPIRIT (November 18 to 19) in Korea; Battle Coliseum (November 24 to 26) in Brazil; Ultimate Fighting Arena (November 24 to 26) in France; Frosty Faustings (January 25 to 28) in the USA.
So far they've only done big character announcements at events either in the USA or Japan so I'm not sure they'll announce who's next at any of these. There might be another big event going on that I don't know about though. Guess we'll find out soon!!
They also covered the survey results in this entry, which are always interesting. These results stretch this post a bit so I'm gonna slip them behind a readmore.
Lots of young players!! No wonder I get Dadguy'd on here so much lol
Bridget is also the current most favorite character globally, followed by Sol and then Ramlethal in 3rd:
Regional favorite character poll for just Strive's cast. These votes were limited to just one character and the DB entry suggests they may allow two votes for this part in future polls:
I've posted this one on here before when it was shown at Tokyo Game Show earlier this year, but here's the overall favorite character rankings by region. A.B.A., Elphelt, Slayer, and Dizzy are the highest:
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Lets talk about the Jimbocho book haul! This was a vacation, not a research trip or anything, so I didn't have set goals - instead I just explored and found things that looked interesting or were attached to my interests and seemed “cool” to own. And that strategy worked surprisingly well:
I will as always highlight just a few of them - if you want me to deep dive one of them, shoot me a message. First up we have the "Erotic Newspaper '97 Highlights", a completely-out-of-nowhere find.
Which right out the gate, really pushing my limits here on the "getting banned" front; I don't even know the rules anymore. Made by the circle 児童販売鬼/Juvenile Sales Demon (!), it is this style of “doujin omnibus” that was decently common in the earlier areas and is sometimes still made today; blending essays, personal rants, art, and full comics, often even on to the same page. And of course, this is about ero-doujin, so that blend gets pretty intense sometimes!
But as an “anime fandom “ researcher documents like these are absolute gold mines. The opening page discusses the late 90’s “bubble” in ero-doujin publications, possible legislative action against hentai being discussed that everyone is worried about, and even has that classic otaku identity tic of politicizing their own identity, mentioning a “Rights for Eromanga!” slogan going around (which it cautions against). It seems like a great biased-but-expansive view of the state-of-play in eromanga circles at the time, which few other documents can give you. Primary sources, baby.
Additionally, amoung its topics it has some sections about Evangelion:
And even a section on Utena:
Yeah that entire bottom corner's just... it just has got to go. I am unsure if this is something I will ever scan - its really niche, and being a porn archivist is not really my goal. But I hope to do a full read and post a summary someday.
Next up in a similar vein, I have a copy of Fanroad Magazine from 1996!
Fanroad Magazine was similar to the Comic Box magazine I have discussed before, in that it collected art & essays from fans about the shows of the day and gave them a place for their voice to be heard. Before the internet this was the only real way to do that en masse; by the 2000’s these magazines would almost all die out as social media replaced them. Fanroad was one of the most popular, having highly structured sections, detailed questionnaires for submitters, in-jokes, the works. And of course this edition was a bit of a targeted buy, as the cover surely gives away - Fanroad released a few issues focused on Evangelion, and this is one of them:
I might scan this one, but first I will give it a read and see how interesting the takes are - it had so much cute fan art though, valuable for that alone.
Next up is a very quick and personal one: Comic Cue Vol 4. Which…what even is this, I imagine you are thinking:
Comic Cue was an off-beat one-shot manga anthology magazine that ran through the 90’s into the 2000's, often focusing, not on hentai, but that middle-ground “erotically charged” narrative stories or comedy shots. Its covers were often just insane - no clue why this cover is in English, none of the magazine is. This one is of interest to me, however, because amoung Volume 4’s submissions is:
Yoshiyuki Sadamoto’s Dirty Work one-shot. Yep, thats right, from the random-deep dive essay I put together analyzing a single line of dialogue Sadamoto wrote for Mamimi in FLCL. Now I own the fucker. That's cool! I like that. I am really proud of that essay due to how much I learned from it, writing about a topic whose specificity seemed like it would be impossible to get that much out of; so owning the actual manga is it centered on feels special.
Speaking of niche Ash-writing references!
We have “Girl’s Life on the Flat Battlefield”, the Kyoko Okazaki Artbook made for an exhibit done on her back in 2015, the cover of which I featured in my essay about the proper translation of “battlefield” from River’s Edge. This is an amazing book in its own right though - its content is so diverse. It has essays from her and from other writers about her work that I hope to read. It has beautiful art compositions and solo pieces:
It has recreations of the actual drafts of her manga as she made them - showcasing things like how she would type up the dialogue and cut-and-paste the printed text into the bubbles, the normal way that was done in the pre-digital composition era:
It has this one section by a contributing artist of photographs of “otaku edgy women” and stuff, amazing documentary work:
I see you, Gunbuster figurine on the table! This is probably the best book-as-a-book I found; I highly recommend it to any Kyoko Okazaki fan for the depth of coverage it has on both her work and the context of her work.
You can see some others of course - I found a few copies of magazines like Newtype and Animage from when they covered FLCL! I would like the Catch Them All - these are all generally scanned & archived already of course, so its just for fun. You can see another book on Okazaki, a really cool academic book on the history of magazines and fanzines in Japanese subculture, and the Gothic & Lolita Bibles that Partner is quite excited about. I am very happy with what I found; there is a beauty in the serendipity of these things. Of course I could have searched Yahoo Auctions for a copy of the Okazaki book, I knew exactly what it was. But stumbling on it in a floor-level cubby while my hands were already stacked with magazines and nearly dropping them in surprise is the magic of the physical bookstore in its fullness. It has its own value that the book itself can’t possess.
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HI sorry to not ask a silly question via here but i coukdnt find a non business email so sorry!!!recently got back into the newsprints world after i reread it for ghe first time since 6th grade a few days ago(i am now a junior☹️ and decided to purchase headlines but noticed that the quality on all the pages except for the first and last one isnt the best;;which sucked while trying to see the little notes and text next to concept art,,was wondering if there was any other way to view headlines in better quality??ive tried exporting it to google drive and files to no avail im so sorry to bother😭 but if not totally ok i understand!! i get that 1:1 fan issue stuff shoildnt be discussed on your Tumblr Page so if i have to be redirected to someone else my dms r open!!if youre not comfortable with that i completely get it either way thank you for making one of the defining books of my preteen years!!!!!<33
Hi there! I'm glad you like the NewsPrints series enough to support the little indie artbook I self-published over half a decade ago! I super appreciate it!
I don't think it's a silly question! This is actually kind of a semi-interesting story in book production, if you're interested in the backstory...
HeadLines was originally a limited print run (only 100 were sold), so it was easier to see the notes and art as spreads in a book you could flip through. After they sold out, I was asked to release it in digital, so I did. It sounds like the font size relative to the images is annoying in digital, though, which is a fair critique!
Unfortunately, 2015-16!Ru decided to use That font in That font size because it Looked Nice in print. I didn't even considered digital at the point, so this book is kind of a time capsule of my aesthetic decisions at that point of my life, the good ones and bad ones. x'D
(That reminds me, I remember the physical edition was $30 and personally signed and sealed. I'd be curious to see if any popped up on ebay over the years.)
The digital version is at screen resolution rather than print resolution to prevent someone from printing bootleg copies at the same quality as the official physical book after buying the PDF for $9. The best view size is around 100% in any PDF viewer, ideally on tablet or desktop. You might still have to zoom in a little to read it, though.
Sorry, let's keep the blame on past!Ru. I'm a new person. :'DDD
(The reason that the covers look like they're 2x higher in resolution is that they're actually twice as wide as the interior pages. The covers are 2-page spreads, but I didn't split them like I did the interiors. When the PDF viewer shrinks them to half their size to fit the PDF viewer's format, it does make the resolution seem twice as high, if that makes sense.
I should have probably also halved them so they looked like the interior spreads. You live and learn!)
TLDR: Sorry. The text-image layouts of the book were intentional for print reading, but they require some zooming in and out in digital resolution, but not too much past 100%.
Thank you again for the words of encouragement! I'm glad that Blue's world stuck with you for so long! Looking back at this project does evoke some ~Feelings~ and memories of growing pains. Next time I make another proper artbook like HeadLines, I'll use bigger fonts and/or get someone else to help me do the layouts!
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What I’m reading these days #5
Previously:
* What I’m reading these days #01
* What I’m reading these days #02
* What I’m reading these days #03
* What I’m reading these days #04
Hey everyone, I hope you're doing all right!
It's been a long while since I wrote one of these posts, almost 5 years actually... Yeah, recently I've been more focused on sharing scans than texts like these or artbook reviews, sorry!
Anway, these days I'm reading four cool books at once so I figured I could make you (re)discover something, so let's go!
What a surprise, yes, I'm reading Dragon Ball again, last time was 6 years ago so I thought I could revisit this cool universe that always brings me back to my childhood. In France we have a "Perfect Edition" which has a bigger format than usual mangas, a new translation and all the original colour pages so it's a great pleasure to read! I'm always in awe when looking at Toriyama's watercolours, they were absolutely beautiful.
I'm not going to dive much further into Dragon Ball because I've already talked about it a lot, maybe take a look at this old article.
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Now something completely different, if you are an avid TV show enthusiast, you might have watched the sci-fi show The Expanse. I discovered it after a few seasons had already aired and really enjoyed it (except maybe the last two seasons which had some flaws in my opinion). I quickly learned that before being on TV it was a very good series of books by a couple of authors writing under a single name: James S.A. Corey. So naturally I started buying and reading these books, loved them and realised that the adaptation was quite good. It took some years but I eventually finished reading the nine books and at that moment, just when I thought I was out of this amazing universe, I saw that there was a collection of The Expanse short stories published under the title Memory's Legion.
So that's what I'm reading right now and just like the rest of the series, it's very cool and definitely fills some interesting holes in the Expanse's lore (plus I always enjoy good sci-fi short stories)! You will learn a little bit more about the guy who came up with the Epstein drive that made space travel a lot easier in the story, the backstory of a cruel but intriguing character (Cortazar), the life of a young Amos (even before he was called Amos), etc. It's a very good read if, like me, you've finished the main series and still want more!
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Let's keep our heads towards the sky for this next book: Moonfire by Norman Mailer. I stumbled upon it in a bookstore in Lyon, France and the cover immediately caught my eye. It's a small but thick book which contains as much text as photos from NASA's Apollo 11 mission (the first time humans beings walked on the Moon back in 1969). Being an astronomy and space exploration fan I just had to buy it and I'm glad I did!
Actually I thought it would be a historico-scientific recollection of this incredible event of the XXth century but that's because I didn't know Norman Mailer! I will let you read his Wikipedia page but he wasn't "just" a writer, he also was a journalist, a poet, an essayist and so on. So instead of simply telling us what happened in that important period of human history, he includes himself in the story as a character and shares his thoughts about the situations, the people, the technology, etc. It makes for a surprising yet very interesting read as he takes this unique opportunity to analyze, criticize even our modern society and more specifically the USA's society of the time.
I'm about halfway through the book and I really enjoy Mailer's way of telling the story but also the incredible photos of the event, most of them taken during the mission itself by astronauts Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins, I cannot stop looking at these shots and wonder what their experience was like. They freakin' walked on another celestial body (actually only two of them did while Collins was busy being the loneliest person in the history of Human life, flying above the far side of the Moon)!
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A couple of my friends work at a local comic book shop and thanks to them I often discover very cool comics, mangas and bandes dessinées (what we call european comics in France). Also it's worth mentioning that the french publisher Urban Comics (they publish a lot of american comics here) is trying to make a selection of their books more affordable and compact for people who don't have much money or space in their home that they can dedicate to comic books. And so in this effort they have started a collection called "Urban Nomad" in which all prices are below 10€ (approx. 10 USD). The first one I picked is Watchmen.
I have watched the movie adaptation when it came out... 14 years ago (ouch!) and really liked it but kind of forgot about it, which is a good thing because now I can re-discover the story in its original format: on paper!
And what a story! Since the first pages I was sucked in by the strength of writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons and colorist John Higgins. The story is so good and feels so contemporary that I have to keep reminding myself that this was made in 1986-87! If you don't know anything about Watchmen I won't spoil it for you but the story takes place in a version of our world where masked vigilantes are already has-been, one of the reasons being the accidental transformation of a man into a God-like version of himself. Because of this event, the course of history is different from the one we know and live in, and in this context one of the few remaining masked vigilantes (pictured on the cover) is investigating a series of murders among his former colleagues. This is all extremely well integrated into the politico-historic context of the time (though once again it's somewhat different from our reality) and it's easy to recognize the quality of Moore and Gibbons' work!
///
Well, that's it for now, I hope you've discovered something, if so let me know! And I'll try not to wait five more years to write a "What I'm reading these days" again.
See ya!
#books#comics#manga#Dragon Ball#Akira Toriyama#James SA Corey#The Expanse#Moonfire#Norman Mailer#Watchmen#Alan Moore#Dave Gibbons#John Higgins
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*UPDATED* Evolution of Miraculous!
Note: so somehow I completely missed out on the 2010 "Miraculous Lady Bug" era, so I had to remake this pist with it included. Sorry! (Also, I'm sorry I haven't posted after my first post, I've been extremely busy since then, but I have lots of ideas for posts for you all!)
Hello! This post is basically the evolution of Miraculous, from The Mini Menace Ladybug in 2005 to the current show today! I'll be explaining each "generation" of the show's production, the fandom surrounding it, and where to find more information. I hope you enjoy! 😊
The Mini Menace Ladybug (2005)
Thomas Astruc first came up with the ideo of Ladybug when he was working on animating the show W.I.T.C.H and met a women with a ladybug shirt. They started passing notes, and one of them was a drawing Astruc made of her as a ladybug-themed superhero. This insipired Astruc to make more fake comic book covers, and he was originally going to make it into a comic book series similar to Spider-man. I don't think there were going to be any magical girl elements at all.
Marinette was actually named Marietta, and the series was going to be much darker, as we can see from covers like "Insecticide". Marietta was probably an adult (in an unamed cover, she is seen driving a car) . She probably didn't hide her superhero identity (her car is literally red with black spots...). Cat Noir's design looked much more similar to Snake Noir's from Miracle Queen. Then Astruc met Jeremy Zag, who was interested in making a cartoon about this concept, which leads on to the next generation. Sadly, there's barely any information about the fake comic book covers out there, and all I could find was the Miraculous Wiki page and a small paragraph on Wikipedia. I don't think there's much of a fandom out there, if at all. Moving on...
Miraculous Lady Bug (2010)
Around 2010, plans started to be made for a movie (and possibly a spin-off series) about Ladybug (at the time named "Lady Bug"). The movie would have been part of a trilogy and there were even plans for a comic book series based on these films. It's unknown if Chat Noir even existed in this concept, and I don't think Tikki and Plagg existed since they were probably introduced by Toei (who probably also introduced the transformations and all the other magical girl stuff). Félix didn't exist, and instead we had a character called Nathan. There is no concept art or information about Nathan apart from his name and that he was part of "the gym club", and since we don't know if Chat Noir existed in this concept he probably wasn't Chat Noir. I don't think there's any information on this era in the Ladybug Artbook, all I could find was the picture above and a page on the Miraculous Wiki.
Super Lady Luck/Early Development Era (2012)
So this one is kind of hard to explain, since it overlaps with later stages of development a lot. The concept was very vague, but this is when we first started seeing Félix...
(Note: the picture above might not actually be from this era. Some people believe that the top half of the picture shows Nathan instead of Félix (and that the art was later redrawn in the PV style), which means that Nathan could have been Chat Noir.)
Once again, since this overlaps with other stages of development a lot, I can't really explain it. Information on this "era" is even harder to find than on The Mini Menace Ladybug. There's actually much more information/concept art/whatever out there, but it's really hard to find. The two main sources for information about this era are the Ladybug Artbook and the game Super Lady Luck. Sadly, Super Lady Luck (also known as "Miraculous" or "Ladybug Adventures") was Flash-based and became unplayable in 2020, and the Ladybug Artbook is only available in Korean and is extremely hard to find (SAMG said they'd publish an English version in 2017, but they never did >:(... )
Quantic Kids (2012)
The Quantic Kids (also known as The Quantic Squad or The Quantic Team) was an early concept where Ladybug and Chat Noir were part of a team of superheroes. Originally the team consisted of Ladybug, Chat Noir, Melodie (a music-themed superhero), Mercury (a superhero with super speed), and Sparrow (who was brought back in the New York Special). Later another member, Gavroche, was added, and Sparrow was replaced by Kid Mime. The concept didn't help sell the idea to producers, whic resulted in Ladybug and Chat Noir staying as a duo. The Quantic Kids actually have a small fandom, with many people coming up with headcanons for their civilian identities. Once again, most information about this era comes from Super Lady Luck and The Artbook. (Please, SAMG, just give us the English version already...)
Miraculous PV (2012-2013)
This is probably the most well-known stage of development. Two trailers were released, one in 2012 (the one that everyone knows!) and one in 2013 (basically the same as the original, but in a different order, with added text and new music). Funnily enough, the original leaked video was never referred to as "Miraculous PV"- it was actually titled "Lady Bug Japanese Version". This was going to be much darker than the current show. Félix wasn't actually related to the PV version of Hawk Moth, Papillon (also known as The Butterfly or Monarch). The concepts of the miraculous were good luck (sometimes called "pure luck" by some sources) and bad luck, instead of creation and destruction. Félix wasn't originally in love with Ladybug- he was cursed with bad luck, and the only way to get rid of it was by getting Ladybug to kiss him- but eventually, he would end up actually falling in love with Ladybug. Sadly, this version was never produced because of worries that it wouldn't sell, and animation problems, like Ladybug's spots. Obviously, the best source of information is the original videos, but there's lots of info in The Artbook, as well (I know I've said this before, but PLEASE SAMG GIVE US THE ENGLISH VERSION. OR AT LEAST A REPRINT. ANYTHING. PLEASEEEE).
(Also, Bridgette was never actually a character. It was Marinette all along. I'm not hating on Bridgette, I love her as a fanon character, just thought I'd point this out).
Later Development (2014)
Around this time it was decided to switch to CGI, and we got this cute, alternative CGI-style transformation (if you want to watch it, you can find it on YouTube, but I forgot what it's called). Around this time, Félix was replaced by Adrien, because he came off as an "anime cliché" and it was thought that Marinette would never fall for someone like him.
Originally Adrien was supposed to walk with a cane, but this was scrapped as the writers didn't trust themselves to write him well. This era has the smallest amount of information on it. Apart from the CGI transformation, the only other information we have is a very short trailer in the alternative CGI style and a few pages of The Artbook (I'd say something about it, but I don't want to annoy you all:)).
Current Show (2015-Present)
I'm not going to say much here, since I'm assuming you already watch Miraculous if you're reading this post! 😁
I hope this post helped explain the basics about the development of Miraculous!
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Fingerpainting
#fingerpainting#descrip in alt text#might also be next artbook cover#black artist#artists on tumblr#rainbow paints
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Fantasy general 2 switch
#Fantasy general 2 switch manual#
But beware: costly victories can be worse than a defeat… when battle-hardened units perish, so does their progression and experience. The young clan members will need to be trained, and as they gain enough experience, even the greenest recruits can be turned into champions. Lead over 75 different unique unit types, including powerful heroes. Take into consideration terrain, weapons and armour, magical effects, morale, and the balance of forces, make a plan, execute it, and vanquish your enemy, forging your reputation as a savage war-leader.īattle after battle, you will need to make decisions and develop your army. True to the tradition of the original game, Fantasy General II: Invasion is all about turn-based battles. You are his son and designated heir, and you are eager to prove your mettle to the Clan Council and your father…Īrmies once again draw battle-lines on the war-torn land of Keldonia, and a new generation of commanders will test their bravery and tactics against each other. In these dark times your clan has been led by Falir One-Eye, a warrior of great renown. Since then, there has been no High King to unite the Clans, and they fell into quarrelling and raiding amongst themselves. The Western Imperial Legion was sent to face the highland raiders, and with the help of the Borderland clans Iseal and Machnar, killed High King Brendan in the battle of Wyrm’s Pass.Ī treaty was signed that forbade any clan from crossing into the Borderlands in return for peace. Fed up with these constant attacks, the Borderland Clans called on the Empire for help – a powerful realm controlling the land from the Scarlett Mountains to Cynehelm Valley and the Hoarwood. In the Highlands of Fareach, Clans of Barbarian warriors have eked out a living in the harsh northern climate, constantly feuding with each other and raiding the wealthier Borderland towns. Three hundred years have passed since the Shadow Wars have ravaged Keldonia and the world of Aer, and the struggles of the past have long since faded into legends. The DVD is included in the book's cover and does not come inside a physical box. You can find more information about it on the Artbook product page.
#Fantasy general 2 switch manual#
The physical edition of Fantasy General II: Invasion doesn't include a manual but it includes a 104 pages long Artbook. You can have a taste of what Fantasy General II: Invasion has to offer by trying its free-to-play version and the Curse short campaign by downloading Fantasy General II: Prologue for free. Vanquish your enemies through a combination of military might, guile and magical prowess. In Fantasy General II: Invasion fight exciting turn-based 3D tactical battles leading a variety of fantasy units, heroes and creatures, level them up and carry them over from one scenario to the next.
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Kirby Translation Docs Masterpost
I was told on Discord I should really compile these somewhere. I may post these directly to Tumblr or WordPress or something eventually, but for now here is a masterpost of links to Google Docs.
These are various documents I've made translation sections of content from the Kirby series.
Please note that I do not consider myself fluent in Japanese, or even a Japanese speaker/able to read/write in Japanese in the first place. At best, consider these a step above some cleaned up machine translations.
𒈯𒈯𒈯
(09/07/2023) Triple Deluxe Miiverse Behind the Scenes Developer Posts, as well as for Drum Dash Deluxe and Fighters Deluxe.
(07/15/2023) All boss pause descriptions and dialogue from Kirby: Triple Deluxe, redone.
(03/11/2023) Return to Dream Land boss pause descriptions, for both Deluxe and Wii
(05/08/2022) Team Kirby Clash Deluxe August 2017 Issue Nintendo Dream Interview with Kumazaki, including info on King D-Mind and the Parallel bosses. Also talks about Planet Robobot and making games as a student.
(04/02/2022) Kirby and the Forgotten Land masterpost.
Master post for Kirby Star Allies: The Original Artbook translations:
𒈯𒈯𒈯
Older Translations
𒈯𒈯𒈯
(08/24/2021 Though apparently I never shared it after I made it until now whoops) Descriptions mentioning Galactic Nova. If anyone can find a scan of the Japanese Super Star Ultra manual's description of Milky Way Wishes, please send me a message or tweet at me @dsgiratina.
(06/07/2021) All Kirby Fighters 2 text.
(06/04/2021) All boss pause descriptions and dialogue from Kirby: Planet Robobot. Note that Kai-alone released his own version of this which I'd recommend trusting over mine, but feel free to use this as a second opinion. Please check that out here.
12/28/2021 Edit: Included the Pres. Haltmann 2.0 description which I forgot, and fixed an error in Galacta Knight's description due to accidentally deleting a character in the Japanese text.
(01/01/2021) All text relating to Another Dimension across all Kirby games. Please note that this is the oldest document, so if these descriptions appear in my later ones above, please check those instead since I might forget (or just out of laziness) to update this doc with better made translations.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ETFQB_joXKdPfALyVtGy3xDFZu_Wbm6lohlwN9fETVI/edit#heading=h.4rtrqzvic6gr
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Tonight, Love Me Kindly and Cruelly (Collection Event) // Count
t/n: The idiom is literally “Candy and Whip”, which is equivalent to the use of “Carrots and Sticks”. “Carrots and Sticks”, as in the idiom that people use to describe when one uses both the promise of a benefit and a punishment to manipulate someone to do something.
random ex: a person says that if you let them stay at your house for a while, they’ll buy you a new phone... but if you reject them, they say they’re going to set your car on fire.
well carrots and sticks don’t make for a pretty mental image so I changed it. lol
In common ikevam fashion, this is a collection event to coincide with the release of Faust’s Main Route. imo the route is doing a better job at showing his chara positively than Will’s route, but..... faust was never my type to begin with so u know LOL
but im only on like chapter 12-ish anyway so yea nothing really significant has happened
anyway, i am pleasantly surprised that the Count got to partake in this one!! it might seem like a really long time since the last Count appearance under the context of this blog, but that’s only really bc ive sat out on covering Count-involved events (namely the AU scenario event w/ a shared route with Leo and the “caring for a child” collection event). i don’t think they’re super bad or anything (i actually like the latter for treading newer ground on event topics for once)…. im just chillin. ive never been a very active blog regardless
Spoilers under the cut!! Please credit if you take any of it, thenk u (･ω･*)
…
[Kara]: “ah-… Mn-…”
In one of the rooms of the party venue—
the air was stained obscenely by the breathless sighs of me and Count.
With my arms pinned against the rippled sheets, my head grew lightheaded as he roughly kissed me over and over again.
[Kara]: “nh- Why are…”
(Why has the Count become like this, I wonder? Until a little while ago, he was sweet and gentlemanly.)
Bewildered, I stared back at his golden irises, and a smile faintly seeped through his lips…
[Count]: “When I thought about you possibly being touched by those fingers, my blood ran cold.
You do not mean to say that you do not understand my own feelings, I presume?”
(‘Those fingers’…?)
…
I recalled something that had happened a few moments ago at the high society party we had been attending.
I was conversing with one of the Count’s acquaintances when it happened:
[Gentleman]: “Oh, My Lady— Your exquisite ornament has shifted out of place, you know.”
(Huh…?)
Before I could fix it myself, the gentleman reached out his hand—
[Count]: “Indeed.”
The Count, who had been standing next to me,
hugged my shoulder with his arm as if to move me away from that hand. Then—
[Count]: “How about this? Mhm, yes… Beautiful.”
[Kara]: “Thank you, Count.”
Of course, I also gave my thanks to the one who initially noticed it, but…
…
(Does he mean that time?)
[Count]: “By the look on your face, it seems that you have finally realized it.”
[Kara]: “Ah-…”
Something resembling both sensuality and sharpness flashed within his eyes,
and he firmly ripped the hair ornament off with a single swipe.
[Count]: “Well, then.
I shall retrain this body— that the only thing that may touch you, are my fingers.”
His fingertips trailed down my lips, my neck, my collarbones…
before pulling down my dress, the fabric sliding off my breasts.
Then, those very fingers touched the reddened peaks…
[Kara]: “-ngh, hah…. nh, ah-“
[Count]: “Do you make this same adorable reaction no matter who pinches you?”
He pinched more forcefully, and my body leapt with a shudder.
[Kara]: “ah-…! N-No, not, at all… Abel, please…”
[Count]: “Really? I still have my doubts, given that your body so easily makes these dirty reactions...”
While he played with my breasts,
the fingertips of his other hand then slid inside the soaked part of me with a wet sound.
[Kara]: “ahn… ngh, haah…”
[Count]: “I shall thoroughly train you,
that the only thing that can bring you to ecstasy are these fingers.
…And train you, all night.”
And just as he had proclaimed,
indecent cries continued to fall from my lips throughout the night.
FIN
me thinking abt how this could’ve been the start to a veri sexi epilogue of a scenario event. next time, next time!!
this was kind of interesting bc the event actually places this one above leo’s (leo is the story before, which puts him at “4th place” out of 7 if we call arthur “1st”). this is weird bc even tho occasionally they’ll mess with story order not coinciding with character popularity if they feel that the story in question is more ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°), but putting leo’s story that early is rly weird. leo’s story being given before even mozart is like…. wow someone’s not too proud of that story LOL
ill be honest tho…. the leo story is pretty basic, past stories in the leo sexi man canon considered. well i get it – leo is not the type to take out his negative emotions onto others, which is more or less related to the theme of this event.
this collection event is only a week long, so im wondering if they have anything interesting lined up. man i hope so…… clearly they kno ppl who like the count exist bc they bothered to move his story up. but where’s the respect!! (jk… partly)
“You really do get a lovely look on your face when you’re with the other manse residents.
…I am, just a touch, jealous. Tonight, let me have you all to myself.”
“(…) …I want you to like me very, very much,
so I work hard to achieve that. Though it may appear otherwise, I’m desperate (to have such).” – Artbook-based Gacha Card
as always, thanks for reading!
#ikemen vampire#comte de saint germain#spoilers#ikevam#lol why does this site still have vocabulary f*lters how else am i supposed to write it
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hello! could you talk a bit more about the original (as in jp, not localization) ouma's personality and speech patterns? you've mentioned that he tends to trail off or speak more softly when it is implied he is speaking the truth, etc. and how he is not so loud/intentionally obnoxious. //btw when does he call himself a fairy? that's so cute
I got a couple of questions asking about the fairy line Ouma has, so I don’t mind sort of rolling them both into one! And I’m more than happy to talk a little more in-depth about Ouma’s speech patterns and personality in the original game, too!
Since I’ll be covering some late-game spoilers, I’ll put the bulk of this under the cut, so be careful when reading!
First off, I cannot stress how much I recommed playing ndrv3 with the Japanese voices enabled. If you’ve already played through the English dub but never experiened the original voice acting cast, I promise you won’t be disappointed. The Japanese cast are all fantastic, incredibly talented VAs who, unlike the dub, were hired specifically for these roles and not just re-casted from previous DR games.
Hiro Shimono as Ouma gives an absolutely incredible performance. The localization might still have many flaws in its translation and omission of certain lines or punctuation, but you can still very much get a feel for how Ouma’s character was intended by listening to Shimono’s performance. Re-playing the game with the Japanese voices will definitely let you hear how soft and tonally different Shimono’s performance is in places from the English dub, and compare it to the way in which many lines are written and punctuated as if Ouma’s yelling at everyone.
That isn’t to say that Shimono’s Ouma is never loud or excited: Ouma is a character whose moods and façades are all over the place, and therefore his performance requires a voice actor who can similarly change moods and intonation on a dime. Ouma is very much loud and haughty and deliberately annoying when he’s supposed to be, but his voice is also low and ominous at other points when he’s trying to be scary. And again, it’s soft and hesitant in places where he’s considering divulging some of his information, or when he’s insisting that all the things he does are for everyone’s sake, because he cares about them and doesn’t want anyone to die.
These moments feel so much more genuine in the Japanese version of the game--because they’re meant to be. As fantastic of a liar as Ouma is, it’s much easier for us, the player, to tell when he’s lying on a re-play, knowing the information from chapters 5 and 6 that we do, and looking at cues like his sprites (often his blank-faced ones) and, yes, his delivery of certain lines.
This probably sounds like me just gushing about what a fantastic voice actor Hiro Shimono is, and in part that’s exactly what it is, but I want to stress that pretty much every single voice actor in the Japanese cast is just as fantastic and that they all do their jobs incredibly well. With all that gushing out of the way, I’ll move on to talking about some of Ouma’s actual speech tics and the way he refers to other characters.
Like most things about him, Ouma’s speech patterns are sort of an interesting mix and even seem a little contradictory at times. He uses the very masculine pronoun “ore” (オレ), but he also refers to nearly everyone (with only a handful of exceptions) by their surnames and the much more childish honorific “-chan” (i.e. “Saihara-chan,” “Akamatsu-chan,” “Amami-chan,” etc.)
The use of “-chan” is very interesting. Honorifics in Japan are extremely complicated and tend to mean different things depending on who is using them. Typically, “-chan” is seen as a very feminine way to refer to someone else, commonly used in close-knit friend groups among school girls.
There are, of course, a few notable exceptions to this however: often times, middle-aged or elderly people will call a child “-chan” regardless of gender, as a way of showing they find them cute and endearing. And sometimes, people will use “-chan” to refer to other things they find cute, such as pets, or even to refer to themselves in a sort of informal, tongue-in-cheek way.
The fact that Ouma uses “-chan” as an honorific to refer to nearly everyone in the game stands out quite a lot: by and large, boys don’t use this term to refer to other boys. Using “-chan” to refer to anyone you’ve just met or don’t know very well is already somewhat frowned upon, but a boy using it to refer to other boys is especially rare. This helps set Ouma’s character up as someone who is both incredibly casual and informal with others (not to mention, you know, quite coded). Considering childishness and lightheartedness are traits Ouma values, and how much emphasis is put on him having “a very innocent, childish streak that’s hard to hate,” it makes sense then that he would talk like this.
Not counting Monokuma and the Monokubs, the only characters who Ouma doesn’t refer to with “-chan” are Gonta and Kiibo, who he simply calls by name. This also says some interesting things about his character.
Gonta is easily the character who Ouma interacts with the most often, as well as the charater he hurts the most in the end. Ouma’s choice to exclude Gonta from his usual way of calling people is, I think, a testament to how much Gonta really wanted to be friends with him, even if their friendship was never exactly on equal footing.
Meanwhile with Kiibo, I feel the choice to exclude him from his usual way of addressing others is indicative of how much Ouma tried to remind himself that Kiibo “wasn’t human,” and therefore how suspicious he found his presence in the killing game. We know Ouma suspected Kiibo and likely even had an inkling of his role as the audience proxy/camera in the game, due to how Kiibo’s picture is one of the only others set aside on his whiteboard besides Saihara’s, with the word “weird” written next to it (he also clearly guessed about the cameras after Gonta’s line in chapter 2, as we see from how he commissioned Miu for the bug-vac).
Ouma clearly enjoys teasing Kiibo a lot, and their banter reads very much like a manzai comedy duo; I feel like Ouma often tried pushing himself to remember that Kiibo “wasn’t human” on purpose in order to not get too attached to him or too distracted from his goal of ending the killing game. I don’t think Ouma’s decision to exclude Kiibo from the way that he very particularly referred to most of the rest of the group was just an accident or a coincidence.
Honorifics aside, Ouma also refers to several characters in interesting ways. He often uses “daisuki na ___-chan” (大好きな) to refer to some of the other characters, a phrase which more or less equates to “my beloved.” He uses this phrase with Saihara more than any other character of the game, but there are a few other instances where he does use it with Amami, Momota, and (if I’m remembering correctly) Kaede. Pretty much every single instance where the localization put, “because I love you” or “because you’re my favorite” whenever Ouma was talking to Saihara was usually a point where he would specifically call him “my beloved Saihara-chan.”
In chapter 4 during the scene where Ouma is alone in the parlor of the VR world, he also specifically, exclusively refers to Saihara as “suki ni natta hito” (好きになった人), literally: “the person I fell in love with.” This line was changed in the localization to, “when there’s a person I like,” which is more or less literally correct--however, the phrase “suki ni natta” is much heavier and more loaded with explicitly romantic implications than “suki” would be on its own, as it’s often used in Japanese love songs and shoujo manga love confessions.
Worth noting in my opinion is the fact that this is the exact same phrasing Maki uses to describe her romantic feelings for Momota. Since Maki’s feelings for Momota are considered canonically confirmed because of this, Ouma’s feelings should be considered equally canon, but a lot of people don’t know this because, well, it’s sort of been lost in translation.
And now, on to the fairy line! Ouma calls himself a fairy in chapter 3, when he pops up in the middle of Saihara and Korekiyo’s discussion of the katana in Korekiyo’s lab. Full of enthusiasm, he decides to touch the sword and examine it for himself; Korekiyo starts to object, but Ouma interrupts and says:
“Come on, it’s not a big deal! I’m like a fairy, so it’ll be fine!”
I’ve always really loved this line and thought it was super adorable, both as a nod to how fairies aren’t supposed to be able to touch steel in most fae mythos, as well as the fact that fairies tend to also have a love for mischief and pranks and lies. The localization apparently didn’t like it so much though, because this line is simply changed to, “Come on, would I lie to you?” instead.
One final thing I can think of as far as Ouma’s speech tics go is that his laugh in Japanese is romanized as “nishishi” instead of “neeheehee,” as this is closer to the Japanese onomatopoeia for the sound horses make--but I actually don’t mind this localization change at all! “Neeheehee” definitely looks a lot closer to the word “neigh” and helps capture that horse joke in a way that I feel like western players can more easily understand.
All in all, while I still definitely feel people can like and enjoy Ouma’s character from playing the localization alone, I still stand by my opinion that listening to the original Japanese voices helps give a much better picture of how the character was intended to come across, and really shows how much depth Hiro Shimono put into his performance. He’s quoted in the official ndrv3 artbook as saying that he believes Ouma is someone who’s actually “really meek if you take away his strong wish to outwit everyone” (credit to @kaibutsushidousha for the art book translation), and I think this interpretation of Ouma really shows through in so many of his lines.
Thank you both for the really fun questions! I hope I could provide some more interesting information about Ouma and the translation!
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