Author: AidanAK47

Fate/Apocrypha – 18[From Hell]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Fate/Apocrypha

I won’t say that blogging is a hard job, really the only thing truly troublesome about it is the amount of time it takes, but sometimes covering a show can be a painful experience. With great shows the trouble comes in that there is only so many ways you can praise something and eventually you start nitpicking at any flaw you can find so that you can have something to say that isn’t gushing compliments. With a bad show it’s similar but in opposite as you attempt to find something worthwhile in a dung pile. However what I truly find painful to write about is when a show has so many good ideas and shows potential in the beginning. Only to have it slowly squandered over the course of it’s run. That is Apocrypha in a nutshell. By which I mean that I really like the ideas in this episode. Jack the Ripper being a bundle of curses from all the children that died pitiful deaths on the streets of London is something I can really get down with. It’s not outlandish for the world of Fate and it fits with the lore of Jack the Ripper in general. Though no matter what I cannot justify the dominatrix stripper outfit, even the rag she wears in this episode is a better alternative.

I really love how they connect Jack to Atlanta who feels the most for the children due to her own trauma of being a child abandoned by her parents. But her change of heart and development is just far too sudden that it’s hard to truly get a grasp on whether these are her own feelings or if she is being manipulated by Jack. And Joan, who takes the role of executioner. Understanding that the cursed children that form Jack can only either continue as a curse on humanity or be cleansed into oblivion. It truly connects to her nature of adhering to the greater good while showing that even if she knows it must be done, it’s still weighs on her. But Atlanta can never accept it and thus vows to kill Joan. Again, there are good ideas here. Nay, great ideas. But it all just falls so flat because the characters are not developed, these conflicts feel forced and staged, the animation is too crude and the general plot feels like lost opportunity. I spoke before about a scenario in which Avicebron’s defeat could have been made so much better and there are plenty of ways this episode could have taken better turns. I even at one point considered Sieg turning into the main villain after Jack exposed him to the evil in this world and having him turn into a Kiritsugu like figure of resorting to any means necessary to remove suffering from the world. Sure it likely wouldn’t fix his character but god it would be at least something.

Instead we go the boring route and have Jack the Ripper defeated by compassion. Or more that Joan gave her a bit of a lecture and Jack just gave up. There is a reason as to why sappy “Love defeats the villain” type ends are often so weak a conclusion. The virtue of it may be right but it doesn’t stop it feeling trite and cliche. In truth we all know what happens when we attempt to get a wrongdoer to see the errors of their ways and appeal to their compassion. After all, we have all gotten into an internet argument at one point or another and the sad truth is that people will always do everything in their power to avoid admitting they are wrong. So seeing someone as childish and psychotic as Jack just give up is not only out of character but utterly absurd. I could rationalize it somewhat if it was because she wanted to join her master in death but that doesn’t even seem to be the case. For some last notes, I am still not on board with this whole JoanXSieg ship and goddamnit can we give Shakespeare something to do?

Kino’s Journey -The Beautiful World- – 05[Country of Liars -Waiting for You-]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Kino’s Journey -The Beautiful World-

Now this is the Kino I remember. Somber stories that aren’t about Kino showing up and being cool but instead about people and fascinating food for thought. We have two stories this week which both include heroes. The first story involves Kino paying a visit to a museum in honor of a traveler who saved the country. It started off slow but it does present an interesting way of showing how people glorify idols and forget they are human as they are. The tour guide constantly dresses up everything this traveler did and owned as if it has some grand meaning while Kino and Hermes silently establish the cruder truth between each other. This is a bit too much of a segway but it reminds me a lot of how some talk of Evangelion and it’s creator Anno. I have seen people speak of Anno like he was some incredible mastermind who always knew what Evangelion would be right from the beginning and weaved an intricate canvas of direction and detail to make it what it is. In reality Evangelion was more lightning in a bottle that became what it was more due to a dwindling budget and Anno’s mental state at the time. But that is it, after the fact people dress up the accomplishment as some grand effort of genius which glorifies the moment of it’s conception. Sort of how some may dress up how they met there lover as some grand event when it could have been much more mundane in reality.

Thus enter the motorrad, a sentient being whose been propped up for display and the only other motorrad to be introduced aside from Hermes. Again the tour guide fashions up a grand story of the motorrad going silent perhaps in mourning of his previous master or having died with him. But the reality is that the motorrad is in pure display at being put up for display and denied the freedom of riding the lands as a motorrad should. The people have glorified the object as a memory of a great man but in doing so have denied that thing it’s very purpose. There was real emotion in seeing the bike pled Kino to take him out of there or destroy him, only to fall into despair again when Kino revealed that she could do neither of those things. This is the Kino I know, she listens to the stories of the people but never interferes. Instead letting things play out, regardless how they may turn out. Still she did at least throw a little hope the motorrads way by telling a boy to reveal his desire to travel to the bike, perhaps resulting in the boy starting to travel much in the same way Kino did.

I liked the first half of this episode but it was the second half that truly stole the show. The story is of a country full of liars as this episode is named after but much like any other Kino story, the title is not quite what it appears. It is true that this country is full of people lying to each other but the intent is rather different from one might expect. This story flips the table many times and your opinion on the situation completely changes with it. We have a bitter story of a man waiting for his lover to come back to a story of a man gone mad after accidently killing his lover in a revolt against the country’s king, to the story of the lover returning to look after her now insane lover who no longer recognises her to an oddly heartwarming reveal of the man not being insane at all and choosing to pretend to be because he is happy with the situation and doesn’t wish to disrupt it.

It’s an odd situation where everyone is lying to each other and yet out of that everyone is still happy to continue lying because their life is better. It’s so conflicting that no one knows the truth and yet are content in the lives they live. In an old episode of Kino there was a situation where everyone could read each other’s minds and that tore society apart while this episode is almost a antithesis of that story. Where no one truly knows what the other person is thinking and hiding and yet are happier than those that know everything about everyone else. The hedgehog’s dilemma laments that people cannot get close to one another without hurting each other but if there is distance through deceit then can a more meaningful relationship be formed? Even if everyone is lying to you does that mean you will be unhappy? Ahhh…this kind of thought…I missed you Kino.

Fate/Apocrypha – 17[Traumerei]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Fate/Apocrypha

You know what? I think I have been been wrong about Joan in how I pair her and Sieg as the things dragging down this series. Joan isn’t all that bad, in fact she could be an interesting character if she just had someone who could get her out of her comfort zone. Yes, the problem isn’t Joan but rather Sieg is all to blame for this. He’s a shameless self insert character whose personal existential crisis is stereotypical and his general personality is just a void without emotion or any real character. He’s a Kirito or take your pick of any of the bargain bin light novel protagonists. Nothing quite exemplifies this more than this episode where “Insert your face here” goes out on a date which this series primary waifu bait. They try to excuse it as an attempt to draw out Jack the Ripper but the plan itself is rather flawed seeing as Jack really should know that Joan is a Ruler class and she also knows something is up with Sieg.

Anyway this date was a painful experience and truly out of line from what i expect from this franchise. True, the first series also features a date between Shirou and Saber but god dammit at least Shirou had character to work with. This episode was about Joan attempting to interact with a piece of wood! I swear I can see how much she seems to struggle with her role here as she attempts to get Sieg to say anything remotely interesting. As they montaged though the event of their “date” it was as though Sieg was some random background character in the images rather than the main protagonist. However I am thankful to A-1 for cutting out a part of the date that involved Sieg asking Joan about whether servants can get pregnant. That was certainly a conversation that I really don’t need to hear. Sadly A-1 also cut out a large part of the Jack fight which would have been really interesting to see and this seems to be a common thing with A-1. Ruining the characterisation and fights that were in the source material. The Apocrypha source material did start out really strong and while I have heard that the source does end up wasted potential, I feel it deserved better than this adaption. But well, C’est la vie.

THere is a nice parallel between Joan and Shirou here as both were killed but have different ways of looking at it. Shirou hated the people that killed him but tossed aside that hatred for the greater good. While Joan couldn’t even bring herself to hate those that killed her. Joan is a saint in every sense of the word and thus she is more deserving of the role to bring salvation to mankind. Can someone like Shirou, who harbors hatred in his heart and resorts to any means necessary to achieve his goals, truly bring humanity’s salvation? Honestly no, because he’s the villain and something’s got to be wrong with his plan. Otherwise we have the Shakugan No Shana final problem where the villains have a plan that’s great for everyone and the heroes only fight them because they are the villains. I remember feeling very confused that the show wanted me to cheer Shana on when by all accounts she was completely in the wrong.

So to clarify, the attack that Jack used on Joan was supposed to be an instant kill technique and was nullified by Joan’s attributes as a ruler. What was supposed to happen was Jack using children wielding knives to attack Joan so she could get away. This was important for two reasons, the idea of Jack giving knives to children and getting them to attack Joan is wonderfully dark. And this was the real reason that Atalanta joined in the fight as seeing Jack take advantage of children really pissed her off. We were also supposed to get Atalanta’s backstory which was to explain just why she has such a soft spot for children. The Apocrypha anime really is shafting a lot of the character development just to move the story forward and I think it would have been a better idea to remove Sieg’s presence entirely and use any screen time he took up to flesh out the cast. Jack and her Master also lost a lot of characterisation as there was a whole series of chapters detailing how Jack was summoned and how she killed her master and decided to be a servant to the hooker that was intended to be a human sacrifice. It’s a pity as I really do love the whole demented Mother/Daughter relationship that these two have. Seeing her master sacrifice herself to save Jack could have been a very good moment, in fact it was executed rather well. But it just didn’t have the screentime to justify it. We got the payoff with none of the buildup and so it just falls hollow.

Dies Irae – 03[The End of the Nightmare Is a Beginning]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Dies Irae

I believe we can safely declare this anime a trainwreck of an adaption. Truly proof that having an anime for animes sake isn’t going to turn out well, nor that following source material alone makes an classic. This anime was crowdfunded by the fans to get an animated version of Dies Irae. Well they got it. However they didn’t think that with such a meager sum that they would get a good Dies Irae anime. Thus we have an anime that makes no real effort to include the anime only watcher while proving to be an inferior experience for the source fan. Much like how Tsukihime fans declare that the Tsukihime adaption of 2003 “does not exist”, it looks that the adaption of Dies Irae is on track to be denied of its existence as well. The sad thing for me is that this was more or less expected, I would have been very surprised if they managed to pull off an adaption of the Visual Novel. Especially when said visual novel depends of the writer’s prose to enhance the events of the story. Masada Takashi’s writing can be overbearing and heavily chunni-tasic but it nonetheless gave the story character. Dies Irae on a surface level is very much a style over substance story and if you can’t sell the style of the narrative then it truly all falls flat on it’s face.

So if you are an anime only watcher who just so happens to want to continue with this(Not sure what you would) then allow me to clue you in on just what the hell is going on. For the anime took the liberty of cutting out the scenes at the beginning of this episode which would have cleared things up. Why Kasumi killing people? Because Ren subconsciously made her a surrogate to the power he received from the Guillotine. And by subconsciously I mean he was manipulated by the vice commander of the Nazi’s to give her power so he would be pulled into this death game the Nazi’s are setting up. What the hell is a that swastika thing the priest was going on about? The nazi’s need to open these seals which have been placed around the city in order to summon their leader into the city. Swastika’s are unsealed either when a member of the nazi squad dies at the place or the seal is fed a certain number of human souls. Take note that in this world souls are essentially magical power. The more souls you absorb the more powerful you become, hence why they show the members of the Nazi group as a giant pile of red skulls sometimes.

So now Ren has taken his power back from Kasumi and now he’s in this game for real. The game is that he needs to kill all the members of the Obsidian round table before they can unseal all the swastika’s and summon their leader. Who will proceed to burn the world to hell should he ever descend. The opening scene of this anime pretty much spoiled how this will turn out for Ren but I suppose it was a given that the big bad would have to be fought. I really have to marvel at just how little this anime cares to clue it’s audience into what is even happening. We had several jarring scenes transitions such as the quick change from Kasumi and Ren to Mercurius and Marie or how abruptly they montage though the point which was to show Kasumi and Ren bonding right before everything goes south. To show how immensely Kasumi hates how Ren and Shirou keep her out of the loop and how she wishes she could at least help them with their problems instead of constantly getting pushed to the side. It’s part of her inherent destined tragic fate, one which each character in this story has. Kasumi is destined to forever be the bystander, to be oblivious and unable to help her dearest friends in their most dire time of need. That said, it doesn’t excuse her character being so dreadfully boring.

Kino’s Journey -The Beautiful World- – 04[Ship Country -On the Beach-]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Kino’s Journey -The Beautiful World-

I have noticed a degree of negativity with this brand new Kino series and true enough, so far it is proving underwhelming. Not bad, but it’s predecessor set a high bar to follow up on. But I believe it’s important to note that the problem here isn’t how the stories are adapted. Instead it’s what stories have been chosen to be adapted. So who have we to blame for choosing the stories? Surely the studio? Well nope, unfortunately the blame belongs to the readers. The stories chosen were picked out of the most popular voted stories in a poll run in 2015. Now things make a lot more sense to me, such as why the story choices are the ones where Kino plays a more active role. I understand that with the 20 volumes of Kino out that it’s hard to pick and choose which stories are worth adapting (Though in my opinion, it should be all of them.) but depending on a popularity poll tends to have mixed results. For what is popular does not equal quality. I don’t think there is any real problem which how the stories are being adapted as the first and third episodes were spot on adaption wise. Both colosseum and this episode suffered from the stories being too big to fit into one episode. Even then I don’t think the stories would have benefited from being elongated. I think we will still get some great episodes mixed in here, it’s just such a shame that more thoughtful stories are going get sidelined for stories that make Kino look cool.

Anyway for a change of pace it’s Shizu and RIko in the protagonist seat as they head to a country which is a floating ship on the sea. Society is split into two groups with the common folk below deck, malnourished and in poor living conditions while the leaders of the ship live above. The story is a bit rushed, in particular when it comes to the little girl who is now a part of Shizu’s crew. But I do like the moral of this particular story. Shizu sees the doomed society and unlike Kino with her no interference policy, decides to take up arms to save the people. In any other story his efforts would be rewarded and he would be touted as a hero. Not this one. The people he saved didn’t asked to be saved and don’t take kindly to some stranger telling them to live on land. Completely ignorant of their own poor status, they decide to board the ship once again ignoring the warning that in a few years the boat will sink, dooming them all. You can take it as an environmental lesson where in people ignore the damage to the world until it’s too late. You can take it as criticism of government where people depend on governments to do right by the people when governments only care for themselves. You can even take it as a lesson on how people will venomously refuse to acknowledge a problem until it’s staring them right in the face. Or even as satire that countries aren’t waiting around for some mysterious hero to come and solve all their problems. Or if we are to get really elaborate, the subtitle of this episode is also the name of a post-apocalyptic novel about a group of people waiting for the inevitable fallout of radiation from a World War to kill them which somewhat parallels the future these people will have to face.

The explanation for this whole situation is that a disease killed off all the adults on the ship country which only left the shi[s AI and the children on the boat. The AI managed but didn’t know how to care for the children, meanwhile the children grew up ignorant and didn’t know how to repair the ship. It does go a way of explaining their child’s dismissal of Shizu’s claims but acts more for an explanation on why the girl was excluded from the society. I found the last minutes of this episode to be rather forced as there wasn’t much build up for the giant escalation of the situation. Having the Tifana girl stab Shizu was certainly unexpected but I found the logic behind it to be rather extreme. Basically her interpreting Shizu telling her to go back to a ship that doesn’t want her as some claim that she is useless to him and thus is thrown away. This was a rather sudden development in the novels too and does feel like an excuse to get her to join Shizu’s merry crew. Thus the parts of this episode that dealt with the country’s situation was the most engaging but when the plot brought things to deal with this girl and Shizu, I found it far to typical for the likes of Kino’s narratives. The only real part I liked about these two was the small moment where they stop in the rain to listen to the drops hit Shizu’s coat. I reminds me of the old moments between Kino and Hermes where they talk of strange topics which bring a sense of wonder to the series.

Dies Irae – 02[The Claws and Fangs of the Beast]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Dies Irae

On the list of top ten worst ways to start an anime episode, I think that panty shots is quite high. Well if it means anything I at least appreciate that Ren didn’t flush up and start stammering, instead acting relatively normal about it. Unlike Kasumi who well reacted in the usual manner of resorting to kicking his teeth in. Like Ren said, you can’t blame the guy if you are the one that put it in his line of sight. So for all one or two of you that are actually still keeping up with this series I say this is the episode you drop. I can’t blame you honestly as this adaption is truly making me question whether the visual novel itself was all that great. It is truly a mark of a bad adaption if it causes you to think lesser of the source. I do remember the beginning of DIes Irae being slow but for visual novels this is usually par for the course. Think of any visual novel adaption and you will likely find it’s beginning to be rather slow paced. Believe it or not this is actually moving at a faster pace than the visual novel and for that I am glad. Truth be told i didn’t really start getting interested in DIes until after this little serial killer arc was done.

Fight animation is better than it was in episode zero but in comparison to fight animation we get today it’s quite lacking indeed. I do recall someone remarking that this anime reminds them of early 2000’s animation and not in a good way. Indeed that is the impression I get as well but part of what is contributing to that is Dies Irae’s obvious inspiration. The visual novel came out a couple years after Fate and many were still chasing Fate/Stay Night’s success and you can certainly see that. Though to be fair the plot actually mirrors another Type Moon work by the name of Tsukihime. The persist in this episode is obviously Kirei inspired and the general serial killer plotline is much like that of Tsukihimes beginning plotline, which also insinuated that the main protagonist may be unconsciously a serial killer.

It’s a pity that the anime skipped over the dialogues between Mercurius and Reinhart as those two really could supervillain monologue. Though the translators might have serious trouble when they start talking. They already appear to be having trouble as terms are mistranslated. For one they are called Lisa, Riza. Calling Valeria the priest of the grail instead of the Golden Vessel. But the biggest mistranslation here is calling the obsidian round table, the black round table. I hear that fans offered to give a terms guide to the translators at crunchyroll to help them stay consistent with the visual novel translation but seems they didn’t take that offer. I mean I can understand a level of apathy with this series but this is a matter of professionalism. If you are going to do the job then do it right. What could make this more of a problem is if the Simuldub of this series(Yes, Funimation is doing one.) goes off the Crunchyroll translations rather than the proper terms. Again though, I did understand if that level of consideration isn’t applied as the series itself isn’t going to do any real justice to it. Still I would like to be surprised and see this series improve as the true story begins.

Fate/Apocrypha – 16[Jack the Ripper]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Fate/Apocrypha

Jack is back and sadly this is the weakest episode so far of the second cour. A big part of that is because it was more or less pointless as while it brings Jack back into the war after a long absence, it really didn’t accomplish anything. This episode mainly revolved around Jack torturing mages to gain information to infiltrate the Black Headquarters and attempt to kill off Fiore. But well once the servants return she says “I will get you next time!” and runs away. So the attack failed and thanks to Jack’s noble Phantasm, the Black team know nothing about her powers or what she looks like despite coming face to face with her. So nothing was truly accomplished. This isn’t how i thought Jack would re-enter the story and I fear that she is becoming another pointless mid-boss much like Avicebron was.

I originally thought that Fiore and the crowd would wish to recruit Jack seeing as she’s a rogue servant and they need all the help they can get to face off against the red servants. I mean sure, there’s the morality issue of joining up with a serial killer but this is the team that was literally breeding people to die in war. Rather silly to have them care about the sanctity of life now. If it’s a danger of her betraying the black side then you can have Joan bind her with command spells. It’s doesn’t make much sense for them to prioritise killing Jack over taking on the gardens of Babylon. Shirou is currently working on a plan that could have devastating consequences for all of humanity so why is it that Jack running around killing mages is a bigger issue?

Not sure why Jack is doing this in the first place as taking out the Black team wouldn’t help her chances of getting the grail at all. They bypass this off with her just being crazy and wanting to kill people but still this just seems far too forced a development. After all, even if she succeeded that would mean it’s her up against all the red servants in the giant death castle. Even if you are crazy those odds are far too disadvantageous. That’s not the only forced element here as when Fiore was attacked a single question went through my mind. Why wasn’t she using her command spell? Command spells do have the power to transport a servant to your side and that’s one of the best reasons to have them in reserve and yet here Fiore seems to have forgotten about it completely. The light novel explanation is that she was just so scared and not thinking straight which does fall in line with her inexperience with combat.

However they also showed her using magic and planning to get her gear which does mean she had some logical thinking. Really if she was trying to find a way out of the situation then the command spells should have come to mind. When it comes to this episode, the word of the day is forced. It feels forced for Jack to attack the black team. It feels forced for her to just retreat after pulling all this. Really this whole sudden conflict just feels forced as if the story just remembered that Assassin of black is a thing and is now trying to find the fastest way to remove her from the plot. As some last notes, I like how they showed that Fiore is unaccustomed to cellphones as mages tend to be rather clueless when it comes to technology. I also like that Sieg is at least getting some payback for his newfound power and I just hope it isn’t somehow negated with another powerup.

Kino’s Journey -The Beautiful World- – 03[Bothersome Country]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Kino’s Journey -The Beautiful World-

One particular thing I really like about this series is that the title of the individual stories often defies expectation. For example we had a country where people were allowed to kill, only instead of a hellish country filled with murderous thugs it’s instead a safe place filled with those sick of murder who only use the law to punish those who attempt to disturb their peaceful existence. Here it is the same, as it is indeed about a Bothersome Country but more that the country is bothersome because of it’s need to be constantly moving. But it’s not the only bothersome country in this episode as we have another country which blocked the plains in order to extort travelers passing through. So it’s up for debate on whether the title refers to the moving country or the other country but I at least like that they didn’t necessarily pick a side in this fight. If we are to paint things black and white then the border country is in the wrong for blocking the plains. But then again the moving country ignored all their pleas to stop and essentially tore through the country. Destroying everything in their path. As such it’s hard to balance this out as simply good or evil but I will say that the moving country did come off better than the border country.

I do laugh at the fact that for Kino this was merely a means to get past the border country without paying the big tolls. I can’t say this was the strongest story but I do like the overall message that much like how the moving country can’t help but mark the land with its caterpillar tracks, people too cannot moving through live without leaving traces. The final evidence of that is that Kino’s defense of the children’s mural will likely result in the children making her the next mural in the next hundred days or so. Hence even Kino can’t not leave traces of her in the places she leaves. This isn’t the strongest story but it is nice to have stories in Kino’s world that don’t end with some dark twist and rather just a whimsical little adventure.

I can’t say I have been fond of the way that this series appears to be selecting stories where KIno plays a more active role than a passive one. We have her breaking her established rules of non interference and her normal three day rule. As this story caps off with Kino showing off her mad sniper skills, I fear that this series may be trying to turn her into some kind of action girl. Now Kino has always been skilled but I appreciate it more when she keeps her talent under wraps. What makes Kino badass is that she doesn’t need to show off and only uses her skills when necessary. If someone started from this series instead of the 2003 version then I feel like they would have a mistaken impression who exactly Kino is and what makes her different from any old anime girl with a gun. Kino is no paragon of justice, nor is she some anti-hero. Kino is an observer who watches the world and only interferes when her hand is forced or in this case, on a whim.

Wonderful Everyday(Subarashiki Hibi) ~Diskontinuierliches Dasein~ Visual Novel Review – 84/100

by AidanAK47, posted in Game Reviews, Reviews by AidanAK47

This may be one of the most difficult reviews I have ever had to write as Wonderful Everyday, which I will refer to from this point forward by its abbreviation SubaHibi, is a story that very much depends on the viewer not being prepared for it. Now I have been looking forward to this game quite a bit, as word online was that it is a visual novel unlike most and delves into some rather dark themes. I backed the Kickstarter and was waiting adamantly for the the release with hope that this could be a title to add to my all time favorites. In retrospect it was the wrong way to approach this story as many overhyped the game and failed to remark on it’s rather large shortcomings. You can buy this game currently on steam but if you do so please do remember to apply a free patch to the game. The reason this is critical is that only the first chapter of the game has been put on Steam and to access the remaining six chapters this patch must be applied. The reason for this is mainly to get around Steam’s rather odd stance against pornographic content and making SubaHibi an All Ages game(Aka, removing the sex scenes) is impossible due to their importance to the story.

A question you are likely asking is what is SubaHIbi about? Answering that question for any other story would be an easy matter but here I must mind my words as I could very well spoil what may be the best part about this story. For you see SubiHibi takes an odd approach to storytelling in that the game is split up into seven chapters. Each which features a different unreliable narrator going through the strange events that took place during a two week period. The goal of SubaHibi is to take these different perspectives on the same events and piece together just what exactly happened and what caused it. As such this visual novel does not follow the standard model of having routes based on which heroine is chosen but instead follows a mostly linear route that has some small side endings. As a fan of murder mysteries I love this approach of taking stories told from different perspectives to piece together an overall narrative and was quite engaged by it. However the first chapter acts as a poor introduction to this story as it is mainly preoccupied with trying to convince you that SubaHIbi is a dime a dozen Yuri visual novel. Walking in with high expectations and reading what is equal to a fairly trashy waste of time is likely to turn many off before they get to the real story. You can argue that the first chapter holds symbolic merit upon completing the story but well you only would see that if you make it to the end of the visual novel.
Continue reading “Wonderful Everyday(Subarashiki Hibi) ~Diskontinuierliches Dasein~ Visual Novel Review – 84/100” →

Fate/Apocrypha – 15[Differing Paths]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Fate/Apocrypha

It’s funny that only now, when we are well into the halfway point of the series that it takes some time to flesh out its cast. Sisgou has gotten some backstory, Fiore was fleshed out a little and even Gordes got some time to prove he’s not a complete caricature. The last one is something Celenike really needed before she was decapitated by Mordred as at least now Gordes has a little more to him than just being some arrogant mage. When I saw Gordes approaching the injured homunculi I was preparing myself to see him start abusing them or taking out his frustration on them. Instead Gordes completely surprises me and actually starts giving advice on how to heal them. He’s still arrogant but now that the Holy Grail War has gone nothing like he expected it’s caused him to look at himself and recognise where he went wrong. He’s just as antagonistic and shortsighted as ever but this at least makes him a better character than what he was. Celenike meanwhile just remains a sadistic bitch and gets her rocks of seeing others suffering. If we had just a few minutes like this to show she had anything else then maybe her death could have held more value.

Flore has also been a character solely lacking development as her defining traits are just that she’s wheelchair bound and has Doctor octopus mecha gear. The flashback to the death of her dog shows that even though she can be a strong leader, she can also be quite naive and too kindhearted for her own good. An observation that Chiron happens to notice thanks to his history as a teacher. It really is small moments like this which can really make a character and what may be the main pitfall of the start of this series as a whole. I mentioned previously that as the death count climbs this could result in the survivors getting more fleshed out and that does appear to be happening. Even learning that Atlanta wishes for all children to be loved is a rather kind hearted sentiment despite her rough disposition. All the more important when you take into account her history where she was abadoned by her parents in the woods and only survived thanks to the pity of Arthemis. Sisgou has managed to keep being an entertaining character thanks to his skills and interactions with Mordred but finally knowing that he has a personal wish as well makes his stakes in the battle all the more important.

I really do love how the two of them delight over planning to stealing the grail while everyone is busy fighting over it. So we now have our factions, the red team has come together under Shirou’s command though there was a mistranslation in UTW subs regarding Karna’s motivation. Put simply Karna said their interests align at the moment so he will fall in line but his one desire is to serve his true master, not Shirou. Shirou seems to have some plan detailed out so that using the Grail won’t backfire on him as that is how it works. The grail has the power to skip the process and deliver the result but you need to know what result that you want. This was the big mistake Kerry made in Fate/Zero when he wanted to wish to save the world, but had no real idea on how to do so. So seeing as the grail was corrupted at the time, it choose to go with the worst way possible to grant his wish. Shirou here seems to know exactly what he wants and the grail here isn’t corrupted so he could very well get it. The big problem is that to accomplish his task could very likely result in something rather horrible, like humanity giving up all free will.

The black team are gathering what forces they can to launch an attack on the Gardens of Babylon which Sisgou and Mordred temporarily working with them. So what of our little rogue element? Assassin of black has done pretty much nothing for quite a while and I worry she might end up being a throwaway character much like Avicebron was. As some last notes, I really, really don’t like that they seem to be going with this Joan and Sieg romance. I have heard others say that if Sisgou and Mordred took over the main character slot then this show would be significantly better and I am quite inclined to agree. Besides that was clear favoritism of your part Joan, giving Sisgou one command spell and Sieg two despite them doing the same amount of work. On top of that they appear to be planting some chekhov’s gun for what looks to be a Deus Ex Machina in the future with his odd command spells. Also can we have more Shakespeare please? His character is criminally underused.