Anyways, what’s been new is Shira Oka is now finally out and can be bought here at Impulse Driven and I’m very excited about it and you should buy it!

Also what’s been new is that I’ve finally decided to taken the dive and actually start studying up on and practice for the A+ exam just so I can become A+ certified to open more doors (and get the heck out of my current job).

Also going to try to get a few things done around the site if I’m not too lazy (yes, I’m lazy, but you all know that already).

And Tron: Legacy is awesome watching it in IMAX 3D, GO WATCH IT!

Second, you’d probably noticed that I haven’t really been updating much.  Just like Horo who’s been busy and been stressing in real life, same thing is happening for me as well.  Been stressed to the point that I really don’t feel like playing or watching anything and slept for the most part of the day and go to work at the evening.

Anyways, I’ve started picking up on C# again since I should really learn how to program, got some ideals in mind that I was to start programming.  I started back up a few weeks ago after a co-worker was kind enough to give me a copy of Visual Studio 2010 (which, in my opinion, is actually a big upgrade from 2008 because of the nifty .NET 4.0 added features).  So I’m learning that right now and trying to get myself better at it.  Look forward to a few applications that I’ll be making when I get better at programming.

Other things that’s been happening in my life is that I’ve been watching some old series that I haven’t either started watching or didn’t finished watching (most of the series I’ve started from the beginning).  I’ve decided to wait until batches came out so I’ll just download the batches and watch them that way until I catch up (which might take me months depending on how motivated I am).  Current series includes: Air Gear, Nagasaret Airantou, and Ghost Hunt.  Those are only a few that I’ve been switching back and forth on, there’s many, many more that I’m watching but too many to list off.  What I might do is change the format of my little rant space here.  See, I was originally going to use this space to also review anime series as well but haven’t in a long due (mainly due to what I stated above) so I might review some older series until I’m able to catch up and actually decide to start downloading episode by episode of newer series.  Who knows, but stay tuned to find out.

Anyways, can’t really think of anything else to say currently so I’ll leave it here for now.

Windows XP/Vista/7
Download via MediaFire
Download via SendSpace
Download from my site! (No waiting in line and fast download!)

Mac OSX
Download via MediaFire
Download via SendSpace
Download from my site! (No Waiting in line and fast download!)

And for those who wants to just use bittorrents you may by downloading it from KickAssTorrents.com

Why didn’t you say anything before? It’s mainly because I didn’t want to say too much at the time due to the NDA that I signed. But now that it has became null I can talk about it now.

So what exactly is this visual novel/dating sim about? It’s about this boy (who you can name during the creation screen) that goes back to his high school life to get a second chance at his life because apparently you are a broke down drunk with no job and no girlfriend.

What’s the game play like? The game play is almost like True Love. If you haven’t played True Love then let me explain. What you do is you choose an activity you’d like to do for the week or weekend and every so often you run into either an random event or a set time event. You know what’s a set time event is if you look at the calendar and see a question mark on a day. You’re also trying to win affection from the girl (or guy) you’re aiming for. Depending on your stats level and the affection level of the characters will land you to there ending.

Wait… did you just say you can aim at getting a guy? Yes, I did, which was kinda odd for me as well on why you can aim for a guy but the way they did it was instead of a dating stand point when aiming for a guy, it’s more of a “we’re going to best buds forever” type of stand point.  Haven’t gotten any of there endings so I’m not too sure how exactly sure how it plays out in the end but it’s not like boy has butt sex with them. Besides, even if I do know the ending, I wouldn’t tell ya =p

Speaking of butt sex, is there any sort of, you know… h-scenes? Are you a perv or what, not all dating sims/visual novels has to have h-scenes to make them good.  With that said, no, this game does not have h-scenes.

This game sounds interesting, do you know how I pick up a copy? This game is currently still in beta stages, currently I have no ideal of when the final product would be done and released but it’s getting really close.

You said in the last post about this game that it’s being created by a start up company, what’s it like helping them in beta testing this up coming game? Pretty awesome to be honest. I’ve been selected to beta test other softwares before (I’ve been selected to beta test OnLive as well just recently but can’t talk about it at all, plus I don’t even remember how I got selected to be a beta tester for OnLive) but there’s some form to fill out on your feedback and what not. With those kind of beta testing there’s tons of beta testers so you don’t really talk with the developers directly and your ideals gets implicated either much further down the line or not at all. Working with Okashi Studios is a treat as there’s not too many testers and you have direct communication with the developers. Some ideals was brought up, next day it was added, it was nice and completely different from other companies when it comes to beta testing software.

How did you became part of the testing team? Funny story, actually, I was on there forums since I’ve first heard about it after FAnime Con 2006, about a year or so later they posted an announcement saying they’re looking for alpha testers and to fill out an assessment form of the computer setup. I filled it out and submitted it. About half a year later they started to actually look for alpha testers and they contacted me. I emailed the person back and forth and turns out they decided to hold off on getting alpha testers for awhile. That was towards the beginning of 2009. A year later, they sent out an email to everyone on there mailing list saying they’re, once again, looking for testers but not for alpha testing but for beta testing. I was still interested so I emailed them saying I was still interested and don’t remember if they remember me but I was emailing back and forth one of there contacts over there. Next day I was online browsing around and I got an email back saying that she did, in fact, remembered me and told me to send an IM to this one person, so I popped onto meebo, logged into AIM, and sent the person I had to contact an IM. First responds that came out of his mouth was, “holy shit that was fast.” And so, it just went from there.

Anyways, I’ll leave it here for now. If you got any sort of questions about the game, shoot it my way and I’ll add it to this post. I’ll also let you know when the game becomes available.

Three years later they have posted some updates including some videos on there YouTube page. Seeing how close they are to finishing it I decided to mention it on here since it seems like there’s not too much talk about it.

So what exactly is a VN? VN stands for Visual Novel, also known as a ren’ai games or H-Games. It’s like a Choose Your Own Adventure book but as a game format and typically I’ve seen it where you read for hours then you’re given a few options to choose from then read for hours again but each choice you choose depends on the ending.  Some of this titles has H (or Hentai (or nudity, I should say)) while others don’t.

Aren’t there any VN’s out in the US? There are a few but not high quality. Most really good VN’s are only out in Japan and is only in Japanese.  If you’re lucky enough to read Japanese, then all you have to do is buy it and enjoy. Other’s don’t have such a luck and would need to wait until someone comes along release an English patch.  Although nowadays it’s becoming more and more popular so expect more VN’s to be out in the US.

What makes this VN that you’re going to talk about a bit more makes it so special? Because of the fact that it’s the first VN ever created in the US and natively in English, that’s why. Well… I guess it’s also because of the fact that any feedback you give them either through email or on there forums are actually taken into consideration compare to other game makers.

But, anyways, moving on, I’m basing all this information off of there official site Shira-Oka.com and Okashi Studios.com as there’s no other references I can use.

So, anyways, there’s a small startup company called Okashi Studios based out in the San Francisco Bay Area (pretty much about 45 minutes away from where I used to live). There team consents of artists, writers, and programmers who share interests in Japanese culture, gaming, anime, and manga.

First game they’re ever making/releasing will be Shira Oka. When will it be released? I don’t know but it would be nice once it comes.

Looking at the videos on there YouTube page where it shows you the game layout reminds me a bit about True Love because of the concept that you have to build up your character which is not like your normal everyday VN.

So what is this VN all about? From the little bit of information on there site it sounds like you have the chance to go back to your days of high school to re-live your life. This is also apparent from one of the videos that’s available for viewing.

But that’s pretty much all the information I can find.  If I can find anything more that’s useful then I’ll post it here, otherwise, check out there site for other information.

Shira-Oka: Second Chances
Okashi Studios

Pretty much from what you can see is that they’re adding on some sort of story to a MV of the most popular Hatsune Miku song Black★Rock Shooter. Also, looking at that Pilot Edition, they’re pretty much using some of the same senses that’s in the Black★Rock Shooter MV but with a bit more animation and sound effects.

I’d have to admit, though, the first time I heard they were going to make Black★Rock Shooter into an anime series I was excited, but now looking at the pilot edition makes me wonder. How are they going to incorporate the two art styles (that is, unless they’re planning on making them the same) and how are they going to do the story line? I guess the only real way to find out is wait until an actual PV is out or when the first episode is out.

Edit: it seems like there’s someone else who has the same impression as me, so check out guuzen’s post.

So who is this feminist group that calls themselves Equality Now?  Well… It’s a group of nothing but washed up hags who wants to take away our freedom of speech.  So what does that mean?  It means they want censorship over EVERYTHING that might be discriminated towards women and girls in any way, shape, or form.  Even if it’s a news paper article about some girl who got raped last night and they caught the guy and they cut off his dick as punishment, they want that censored.  What’s worse is that they’re “armed” with what they call CEDAW (Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women).  Don’t know what that means? Re-read this paragraph again.

So this so call group is setting up some sort of temporary office in Japan to try to take away their free speech over there like they do to us Americans.  It’s honestly no wonder why the world is so fucked up to begin with.  With so many people who lives inside of a bubble and is too ashamed to show their body to the opposite sex.  In fact, it’s a sin to even talk about sex (according to that so called group).

So what does this all mean?  It means they’re going straight to the heart of a country that given us otakus the light of licensed anime in the US.  If it wasn’t for the pioneers of the fan subbing community back in the good old days when it’s a sin to even mention anime that anime wouldn’t be as popular as it is now.  It was because those companies saw that there is, in fact, a market out in the good old USA for anime.  Which is also another reason why we have some good eroge games and soon some really great eroge games (since Nitroplus has teamed up with JAST).  And this so called censorship group pretty much wants to put an lid on it.

This means what the pioneers and the current otakus has worked so hard for is being cocked blocked by a bunch of feminist who claims that it’s poison to the sociality?  What’s poison to sociality is the fact that we even have censorship to begin with.  I mean, come on?  Who is it really protecting?  I mean, they show some guy, his wife, and his children getting killed on CNN for crying out loud.  The censorship is a joke.  What makes it alright to show such stuff on CNN while it’s not alright to have it in my anime or manga?  I mean, come on, another prim example would be the crappy movie, The Last House on the Left, where it clearly showed an underage girl getting raped.  Why isn’t that so called Equality Now isn’t saying anything to the film makers of that movie?  Why aren’t they saying anything to CNN about showing clips of a women his her daughters getting there head cut cleanly off?  Or those tons of other media?  Is it because those who are producing those have more money?

If that’s the case, then it makes sense why they’re going after my hentai, anime, manga, and video games since they’re pretty high on the totem pole for that so called group to hit.

What do I think?  I think censoring everything and anything is a bad ideal to begin with because if we enact censorship then sense of pleasure will never end which will turn into violate people and actually ease our pleasure onto other people.  At least with other forms of media it ease our pleasure for whatever we’re in the mood for.  In a mood for killing a hooker?  Pop in that GTA IV game, drive up to a hooker, take her to a dark alley, once she’s done run her over and get your cash back and there you go, that ease my pleasure of wanting to kill some ho.  In the mood of slicing some heads off?  Pop in that game of Gears of War and start slicing and dicing, there my thirst for blood has been taken away.

Point being, censorship is bad when it’s going this far.

Articles in question that got me to write this post:
Equality Now: "We Should Censor Other Countries"
Equality Now: "Unprecedented" Criticism Over Eroge Ban
Equality Now Demands UN Hentai Ban
UN Demands Hentai Ban