1934: Across the Universe

I’ve been rewatching Star Trek recently and simultaneously introducing Andie to it. At the time of writing, we’re coming up on the end of season six of The Next Generation and a few episodes deep in Deep Space Nine, because yes, I’m one of those people who likes to watch overlapping shows chronologically so the few-and-far-between crossover episodes happen at the “right” time.

I’ve been really enjoying them. I reached something of a saturation point with Star Trek in my late teens and early twenties as it was on TV an awful lot and it was one of those shows I liked to record every episode of on video. I started collecting the official videos at one point and even had some of the more ostentatious box sets — such as the awesome Data one which had a metallic mould of Brent Spiner’s face — but eventually reached a point where I simply parted ways with it, not because I was no longer enjoying it or had seen it all — to date, there’s a significant chunk of Deep Space Nine I’ve never seen, I’ve not seen beyond the first season of Voyager and I’ve been surprised how little I remember of The Next Generation — but simply because there were lots of other things vying for my attention.

With the modern age of video on demand, though, you can watch a show like Star Trek at your own pace when it’s convenient to you, and with no fear of missing episodes because you’re out on Wednesday nights at 6pm or whatever. This gives the shows a much greater feeling of coherence than if you’re watching disjointed — and sometimes out-of-sequence — episodes once a week on the television, and makes it into a much more enjoyable experience as a result.

Although I’m enjoying revisiting The Next Generation — and, as noted above, have actually forgotten a significant amount of it, so rewatching these episodes feels quite “fresh” — the main thing I’m looking forward to is the completely new episodes of Deep Space Nine. For some reason, when I was younger, I and my family regarded Deep Space Nine as “the boring one” in the Star Trek pantheon, with it not getting truly interesting until the fourth season, when they sped up the theme tune a bit, gave Sisko a badass starship to fly around with and decided it was high time the Klingons started being villains again. Watching it with more mature eyes and — I like to think, anyway — refined tastes, I’m liking it a lot more than I used to for its emphasis on characterisation and relationships over tales of derring-do in space. It’s a good complement to The Next Generation, and watching them in parallel as we have been really highlights this.

Also Odo is a work of genius, combining witty writing with some wonderfully deadpan delivery by Rene Auberjonois. I’m especially interested to find out more about his particular story arc, as that’s something I’ve only seen dribs and drabs of here and there; I stopped collecting the videos and watching the show just as the Dominion storyline was getting underway.

There’s still a long way to go before we’ve watched all of them, but I’m not complaining; the shows — with the possible exception of the first couple of seasons of The Next Generation — very much stand up to the test of time and, while occasionally cheesy (rocking camera shots while people throw themselves around the set ahoy!) remain some of the most interesting, enjoyable, dramatic, emotional and thought-provoking television there has ever been.

Here’s to the final frontier.

1925: Tiger and Dragon

I finished watching Toradora! last night — I also forgot the time we normally raid in Final Fantasy XIV on Monday nights, so I had to split the last episode in half — and I have to say, I’m very much a fan.

I knew nothing at all about the show going into it, aside from what a few of the characters looked like and that it was by the same person who did Golden Time, which those of you who have been reading for a while will recall was the last show I watched all the way through. I enjoy jumping into things like this, whether they’re books, movies, TV shows, anime or games. It means that you can start watching/playing/reading/whatever with no preconceptions, and it also means you have that genuinely pleasurable sensation of not knowing what is going to happen next — and the equally fun ability to play “Wouldn’t it be cool if…”

Toradora!, as it turns out, ended up pretty much where I expected it to end up, albeit with a bit of a twist in the latter half of the last episode. It was an enjoyably unpredictable ride along the way, however, featuring some extremely complicated interpersonal relationships between the main cast members — who were, in turn, complicated individuals in their own right.

Ryuji was a good protagonist. Eschewing the frequently-seen blank-slate or self-insert protagonist found in a lot of anime — particularly slice of life, romance or harem anime — he was an interesting character whom we gradually came to understand fully over the course of the whole show. The show sensibly didn’t batter us over the head with his personality traits or angst; a lot of his characterisation was quite subtle, with the things he didn’t say often being as important as the things he did say.

Taiga, meanwhile, was an exciting leading lady. Brash, unpredictable and quick to anger without relying completely on the tsundere trope, much of the show’s “point” — if indeed it had one — concerned the audience and Ryuji alike coming to understand exactly why she seemed so angry at the world. Again, though, the show didn’t fall into the trap of having her make overly melodramatic gestures of angst throughout; the things that caused her pain were real and relatable, and her relationship with Ryuji was believable and heartwarming to watch grow.

The other cast members all had their interesting elements, too. Minori, for example, lets her genki girl attitude slip more and more as the show progresses and reveals that her feelings for both Taiga and Ryuji are complex, conflicting and difficult to know what to do with. Ami, meanwhile, underwent some interesting development from being a simple two-faced bitch to someone with depth and not always entirely clear motivations. I did find Ami’s falling in love with Ryuji to be a little hard to swallow — it felt a little like drama for the sake of drama — but it added an interesting twist on proceedings.

I was surprised that the show had two surprisingly brutal fight scenes, too; these weren’t sexualised catfights that were intended to be arousing rather than shocking, as sometimes seen in more fanservicey anime, and nor were they overdramatic, exaggerated conflicts that, while stylish, were out of place with the rest of the setting and characters. They were gritty, believable, brutal and genuinely quite upsetting outbursts of anger from people who had been bottling things up for way too long. (As a fellow “bottler”, I could relate very much to the feelings in these scenes, although I have thankfully never come to blows with anyone over this sort of thing.)

Ultimately, everything wrapped up fairly neatly, but there was a pleasing tang of bittersweetness to the ending; the understanding that, despite your best intentions and grand plans, things don’t always go exactly as you expect them to — and that in a complicated situation of personal relationships, you need to know when to let go, otherwise somebody is going to get hurt.

I very much enjoyed the show as a whole, and understand now why it’s such a well-regarded anime. I think some lighter fare is on the table for my next show to watch, however; after an hour or so of several people I follow on Twitter exchanging a series of rather racy pics earlier, I’m strongly considering checking out High School DxD, because who doesn’t love a bit of fanservicey nonsense? Boring people, that’s who.

1919: #WaifuWednesday – Shin (Criminal Girls)

The temptation to pick another Senran Kagura girl this week was very high indeed — I’ve just finished the main story of Shinovi Versus and there are, after all, 25 very interesting female characters in that game. But since I’m planning on doing a more comprehensive Senran Kagura writeup over at MoeGamer later this week when I’ve finished all the side stories in Shinovi Versus, I thought I’d mix things up a bit and show a bit of appreciation for the girl who currently graces my Windows wallpaper on my living room PC: Shin, from Criminal Girls on Vita, which I beat a few weeks back.

Spoilers ahead.

Shin, real name Makoto, is based primarily around the commonly used anime trope of the hikikomori, or shut-in. A renowned, well-known and somewhat notorious MMO player who was viciously bullied in real life for her interests and passions, Shin had, over time, retreated from society to live in her own private world where she felt safe. She’d done this to the exclusion of everyone around her — going so far as to lock herself inside her room and only eat whatever food had been left outside for her.

When you encounter Shin for the first time in Criminal Girls, none of this is apparent. She simply seems like an overconfident “leader type”, wanting to boss everyone around and, as the oldest member of the group, believing that her opinion carries a considerable degree of weight. Her “leader type” personality is even reflected in her game mechanics; by herself, she’s not very formidable, but most of her power comes from her “Operation” skills, which partner with at least one other party member to effectively deliver multiple special attacks in the space of a single turn.

Over time, her facade slips, however; she continually makes poor decisions that put the group in danger, and throwaway comments she makes gradually reveal her otaku side. It eventually becomes very apparent that she’s trying desperately to be someone that she isn’t, and that by hiding herself away she’s hurting the people around her.

The main thrust of Criminal Girls’ story surrounds the player’s attempts to “redeem” the titular girls from their past sins, to prevent them being incarcerated in Hell and giving them another chance at life. Shin’s sin, then, is that of neglecting others; she personifies the Deadly Sin of Envy. She envies those who have a normal life and is embittered by her drop-out, shut-in existence; the arrogant persona she initially displays is both a reflection of the character she played online and of who she thinks she “ought” to be — a persona she believes to be more likeable.

As the girls and the player character come to trust one another more, though, Shin starts to open up. She’s more honest and less confrontational, though she still bickers with the rather spoiled Kisaragi; the two are more similar than either of them would care to admit. Most importantly, she learns through others accepting her that it is also possible to accept herself without being ashamed; there’s no need for her to cut herself off from her problems and hide away. In doing so, in fact, she had simply made matters worse; the longer she was alone, the more she believed she needed to be alone, and so her resentment and envy towards “normal” people grew.

Those of you who know me well will surely not be surprised to hear that I found Shin to be one of the most relatable characters in Criminal Girls. While I haven’t gone to the lengths she has — I’m fortunate enough to have a good circle of friends (both online and off) and a wonderful fiancee who tolerate, understand and accept the things I’m interested in — I can very much empathise with her feelings of isolation, the suffering she endured while she was being bullied and her envy for people who seem to be able to go about their business “normally”. I’ve been through some of the things Shin has been through — though fortunately in my case it didn’t involve a literal trip to Hell and back — and as such she occupies a special place in my heart.

A toast to you, then, Shin; you were one of numerous reasons I’m glad I made that journey through Hell.

1914: I Wish I Liked Star Wars More

Recently, there were a couple of big bits of Star Wars-related excitement: the release of a new trailer for the upcoming movie, and some “not gameplay footage” footage of the upcoming new Star Wars Battlefront game.

And… I don’t really care.

This post isn’t, however, a tirade where I get angry at people who are into Star Wars — certainly I don’t begrudge anyone their excitement over the new stuff, and it’s nice to see something people can get enthusiastic rather than angry about for once. No; rather, it’s a contemplation of why I’m no longer into Star Wars now, in 2015, when many of my peers are.

In theory Star Wars should be right up my alley. I like sci-fi and I like fantasy, and Star Wars combines elements of both, being, essentially, a tale of heroic fantasy, mysterious magic and dastardly villains… and a tale that just happens to be set among spacefaring civilisations rather than the more conventional quasi-medieval setting of most fantasy.

And yet I just can’t muster any enthusiasm for it any more.

I don’t think it’s the fault of the films themselves. A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi are all still solid films, albeit somewhat cheesy at times; The Phantom Menace is a bit poo but inoffensively so, and Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith are both perfectly competent, exciting movies. I recall a couple of years back I watched them all through in sequential order — The Phantom Menace first, Return of the Jedi last — and found it to be an enjoyable experience that actually made the prequels seem a bit better than I had previously thought.

I’ve not felt any sort of urge to watch them again, though; I don’t think I even own a copy of them any more, having ditched most of my DVD collection the last time we moved house. I’m kind of done with Star Wars; I got all that I wanted to out of it, and moved on.

Except Star Wars didn’t want to move on, and I think this is why my excitement and interest in it has completely faded over the years. Over the years since the prequel movies, we’ve had TV shows, animated shorts, websites, video games, toys, novels, comics, fan movies, endless speculation, memes, and the Great Unwritten Rule of Geekdom: that if you don’t like Star Wars you’re not a proper nerd. (I don’t actually believe this last one, of course, but I have had a few looks of surprise when fellow nerds have asked me what I think of something Star Wars related and I’ve responded that I’m not really into it.)

In other words, Star Wars was inescapable and being used more as a gigantic marketing juggernaut than anything else. I’ve become very aware of this sort of thing over the last few years — I think working in the press and seeing long-running PR campaigns for various blockbusters “from the inside” jaded me somewhat — and I was just getting a little fed up of seeing it seemingly everywhere. That manifested itself in the realisation that I didn’t really care for Star Wars any more, and a response to the announcement of the new movies and games best described as “meh”.

I’m kind of sad about this in a way, and I do stand by my title for this post; I do wish I liked Star Wars more, because it would be nice to share in some of this excitement, and it’s nice to reminisce about classic games like Super Star Wars, X-Wing and TIE Fighter. But, for me, at least, I think that ship has sailed (or done the Kessel run in however-many-parsecs-it-was, insert your own tortured metaphor here) and I’ve moved on to my own things that people give me blank looks about when I express my own excitement and enthusiasm. It all balances out, I guess.

So for those of you into Star Wars, I hope the recent reveals were everything you hoped they’d be. And for those of you not… well, I’ve got a nice quiet little corner of the Internet here. Pull up a chair and I’ll put the kettle on.

1907: Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?

I have a large backlog of TV, games and anime to plough through, so it’s pretty rare that I will come to something the moment it’s released, particularly if I have to wait a week between new episodes. The last time I did it was for the first season of the anime Sword Art Online which I don’t care what anyone says, I enjoyed a whole lot.

Appropriately enough, it’s another anime that’s got me doing it again this time: the somewhat cumbersomely titled Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?, also known as Danjon ni Deai o Motomeru no wa Machigatteiru Darō ka or DanMachi for short. (I shall refer to it as DanMachi hereafter for the sake of brevity.)

DanMachi is, like many anime, based on a light novel series, and the first episode of its anime adaptation recently aired. It seems to be picking up a lot of buzz already (some of which is admittedly due to little more than the physical appearance of heroine Hestia) and is looking like it will be one of the “biggies” this season if the early enthusiasm is anything to go by — and judging by the first episode, it looks like being a lot of fun, too.

It’s a premise and setting that appeals greatly to me. Set in what appears to be a typical Japanese role-playing game world — complete with various humanoid races including the obligatory catgirls — DanMachi’s protagonist is a young man named Bell, a level 1 adventurer and the sole member of the “Hestia Familia”. The “Familia” business involves the gods having come down to the mortal realm to give up their powers and live among their people; adventurers pledge allegiance to a particular god or goddess’ familia in order to receive special powers to fight monsters and grow stronger through their experiences. Levelling up, in other words.

Young Bell, as previously mentioned, is the sole member of the goddess Hestia’s familia. It’s not yet clear after one episode why Hestia only has Bell, but she doesn’t seem too upset about it; in fact, she seems rather taken with him. Hestia herself is an energetic, impetuous tsundere of a goddess who so far seems to be pretty open about most things but quick to anger, somewhat jealous and rather possessive of Bell.

Hestia is kind of adorable, to be fair; she seems to be the main reason a lot of people have been drawn to the show.

As you might expect, this sets things up nicely for some tension. In the opening moments of the show, Bell is rescued from the fifth level of “the dungeon” — far too difficult for an adventurer of his calibre — by an experienced female warrior named Aiz Wallenstein, whom he is immediately smitten with. His rather hasty obsession with her manifests itself as his first ever “skill”, which Hestia immediately does her best to try and conceal the presence of: it allows him to grow in strength considerably more rapidly than other adventurers, so long as his feelings remain strong. Wanting Bell to succeed, Hestia encourages him to do his best, but is somewhat hurt when the huge amount his “stats” jump up by reflect seemingly very strong feelings for Aiz.

Late in the episode, Bell is sitting in a pub enjoying a meal, when Aiz’s adventuring party comes in. They don’t notice him, but they knew of his initial encounter with Aiz, and one particularly obnoxious member mocks and insults him for being “too weak” for Aiz. While DanMachi isn’t explicitly intended to be a reflection of modern online games like Sword Art Online was, it’s difficult not to read this as a reference to overconfident elitist players of games like Final Fantasy XIV who see themselves as “superior” to newcomers, even when it’s not a fair comparison. I don’t doubt that Bell will see this obnoxious scrote of a catboy get his comeuppance before the series is out, and I already know it will be a satisfying moment.

I’m glad I checked out the first episode, then. So far, despite the inane-sounding title (particularly when it’s in English, as Crunchyroll has it) it’s shaping up to be a really interesting show, and I’m already looking forward to seeing how it develops. Oh, and I want a game of it already.

1906: Waifu Wednesday

There’s a sort of tradition among anime and game fans on Twitter — well, game fans who are into the Japanese end of the spectrum, anyway — called Waifu Wednesday, which is often used as a simple excuse to post lots of pictures of anime girls the posters in question find attractive, but sometimes also used as a means of celebrating a favourite character for more than just their physical appearance. Perhaps their story arc resonated with the person who posted it. Perhaps they simply liked them as a person. Perhaps they represented an ideal they wanted to aspire to. Whatever the reasons, Waifu Wednesday is a thing, and, well, why not here too?

For today’s Waifu Wednesday, then, I think I want to talk about Nepgear, pictured to the right.

Nepgear, as those of you paying attention to my deviant, disgraceful taste in video games will already know, is the protagonist of Hyperdimension Neptunia mk2 (and its recent remake Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth2) and the sister of series protagonist Neptune. Specifically, she’s Neptune’s younger sister; in the series’ tradition, she is the personification of a specific game platform, in this case the Sega Game Gear to Neptune’s… well, Sega Neptune.

Nepgear isn’t the only younger sister character to make an appearance in the series. Sony PlayStation personification Noire — who you better believe will be the subject of a future post like this, because she’s one of my favourite characters in the series aside from Nepgear here — has a younger sister called Uni, who represents Sony’s handhelds the PSP and Vita. Nintendo Wii personification Blanc, meanwhile, has two younger twin sisters called Rom and Ram, who between them represent the two screens of Nintendo’s handhelds the DS and 3DS.

The fact that these characters are personifications of well-known brands and platforms is one of the most well-known things about the Hyperdimension Neptunia series, but it’s also one of the least important things about them; it makes up little more than their concept and, in some cases, influences aspects of their design or basic personality type.

The reason I like Nepgear so much is because I can see a certain amount of myself in her. Obviously I’m not a young, pretty, skinny girl — I’m pretty much the exact opposite of her in that regard — but I find her personality and the way she goes about her business to be eminently relatable. Why? She’s awkward, she’s nerdy, she’s lacking in self-confidence and often finds herself the butt of jokes: these are all traits I became aware of in myself when I was younger, and which persist to this day.

It’s not just about “negative” traits, though. Although often doubting her own abilities, for example, Nepgear is someone who will try her very best and follow through on a plan when she makes it, even if things don’t go entirely as envisioned. She tries hard to do the right thing in all situations — though doesn’t always succeed — and makes an effort to bring people together and ensure they are getting along with one another. Obviously she then goes on to fight giant robots and evil goddesses and whatnot, which are parts of my life that haven’t happened as yet, but, without wanting to sound too arrogant, for the most part she represents some of the aspects of myself that I actually quite like.

Aside from the relatable aspects, Nepgear is just an altogether pleasingly wholesome character; she’s cute, sure, and in her transformed “Purple Sister” form (left) she ups the sexy quotient considerably, but she has never been a character that attempts to take advantage of either her cute or sexy aspects.

Instead, well, I’ve already used the word wholesome above, but it really is the best way to describe her. She’s someone who is very pleasant to spend time in the virtual company of, and she’s just plain nice. The kind of person who would always have tea and cake for you if you stopped by; the kind of person who remembers your birthday; the kind of person who does random acts of kindness without any expectation of reward — and who often doesn’t receive any kind of reward for her hard work.

In many ways, poor old Nepgear is one of the most “normal” people in the entirety of Hyperdimension Neptunia, and she suffers a bit for it. There’s a running gag in the games that followed her starring role in mk2 where she’s paranoid about everyone thinking that she’s “boring” and, when you compare her to the other characters in the series — particularly the pure, unbridled chaos that her sister Neptune tends to create in her wake — it’s perhaps easy to see why she worries.

But even if she goes unappreciated in her own dimension(s), I certainly appreciate Nepgear, and thus it’s with pleasure that I give her the dubious honour of a Waifu Wednesday post on this little backwater blog.

1904: 21st Century TV

The Internet has brought with it many things both good and bad, but by far my favourite thing about it is to do with video.

No, I’m not talking about YouTube generally — the whole “anyone with a webcam can make videos!” culture it promotes feeds into modern youth’s unhealthy obsession with “being famous” — but rather the fact that, between the various streaming services out there, both legitimate and… less legitimate, there is probably some way of watching all those programmes/adverts/movies you wish you still had 1) the VHS tapes for and 2) something to play them with.

This last week, for example, Andie and I have watched Police Squad!, the TV-based precursor to the Naked Gun movies. Only six episodes were made, and back at university, when I “discovered” the show for the first time, I had a VHS cassette with two of them on it, so I had only ever seen those two episodes. Now, however, some helpful Polish person has kindly uploaded the whole lot onto YouTube for anyone to enjoy at their leisure. No waiting for TV networks to license them and show them again. No tracking down video tapes and VCRs. Just click and go.

The ability to rediscover old favourites is one of the best things about streaming video, then, as my rewatch of Star Trek: The Next Generation for the first time in about ten years will attest. But the fact that streaming services makes new favourites easier than ever to discover, too, is rather wonderful. I doubt I’d have become so interested in anime without my Crunchyroll subscription, for example; prior to widespread streaming video, the only real way to get into anime was to buy VHS tapes or DVDs, and with anime being niche-interest and somewhat “exotic”, particularly when it first hit these shores in the mid-90s, it was a rather expensive hobby. Anime DVDs and Blu-Rays still cost up to twice as much as a regular ol’ Western film even today, making online services like Crunchyroll much better value.

This is the TV of the 21st century, then; it really is the vision of the future we had twenty, thirty years ago: decide what you want to watch, then just watch it. In most cases, that’s possible to do, even if you have strange, bizarre and peculiar tastes. And even if you’re more fucked up than most, I can almost guarantee that there’s some dark corner of the Internet out there somewhere more than willing to cater to your particular interests, whatever they might be… for better or worse.

In these days of people seemingly constantly yelling at one another on social media and comments sections on large sites being widely (and, sometimes, justifiably) regarded as fetid cesspits, it’s easy to forget the great and wonderful things that the Internet has brought to modern life. I’m a strong believer that its ability to “archive” — for future generations to be able to enjoy movies, TV shows, animations and other videos from years ago — is one of the best things about it. And as technology improves and we find more and more ways to interact with this world-wide network, I hope we never lose sight of these simple pleasures that it’s allowed us to enjoy like never before.

1903: Easter Sunday

It’s Easter today. This is one of those days that declines in importance as you get further away from childhood, until you reach the point I’m apparently at today, where you just ignore it completely.

That’s kind of a shame, really, as it was fun to have specific days to look forward to for whatever reason — birthdays and Christmas for presents, Easter for chocolate — but I can’t help but feel that most of these occasions are made a big fuss of primarily for the benefit of children.

This isn’t a bad thing, of course; in many ways, modern children are being forced to “grow up” much too quickly, and thus allowing them days of unmitigated excitement about imaginary figures and the prospect of presents coming down from on high is an important part of allowing them to cling on to their childhood for as long as possible. There’s a difficult balance to strike as well, of course: ensuring that said children don’t end up spoiled and turning into those ungrateful (and probably fictional) brats that Buzzfeed et al dig up every so often, who whine on social media about getting the wrong colour iPhone or a car with a sunroof when they wanted a convertible or whatever.

Perhaps it’s just cynicism on my part that prevents me from enjoying these occasions as much as I did when I was younger. Perhaps it’s my depression contributing to matters, making me either unwilling or unable to just switch off and enjoy myself without worrying about the things that worry me every other day of the week. Or perhaps it really is the case that I’m too old to care about these things a great deal any more, and would rather just take aim at the big picture, the seemingly unattainable aim of having a quiet, peaceful life with no worries.

One thing I will say about ignoring Easter today, though, is that I haven’t really missed chocolate. In fact, I haven’t really had much chocolate since joining the Slimming World programme a while back. The “syns” system allows the flexibility to have a chocolate bar now and then, and there’s some tasty Slimming World-branded chocolate chewy bars that are rather nice, so I haven’t had to go entirely without sweet things. But as fun as it was to have a sideboard covered with various shiny eggs come Easter morning — and then to spend the next few weeks getting through them a bit at a time, feeling slightly guilty at ruining its pretty presentation every time I cracked another one open — I can’t say I’ve particularly missed it today. And my waistline will probably thank me for not having temptation lying around the house!

So, then, balls to Easter, I guess, and balls to the bank holiday tomorrow; it’s hard to enjoy and appreciate it when you’re not really getting time off from anything — but if you’re currently enjoying a four-day weekend away from work and the pressures of “real life”, I hope you continue to do so tomorrow, and that you, at least, enjoyed stuffing your face with chocolate this Easter Sunday.

1900: 20th Century

Post 1900. Feels like a significant number. I feel I should do something significant, but I’m not sure what.

Perhaps a reintroduction for those who are just joining me, and an explanation of what that “1900” is all about.

Hello. I’m Pete. I’ve been writing on this blog every day for the past 1900 days. It initially started as a Twitter-based challenge called #oneaday in which the participants were challenged to write absolutely anything every day for a year. I joined a little late, only hearing about it midway through January of 2010, but I decided it was something I wanted to be a part of, so I jumped in. Not everyone who started made it to the end of the year — hell, some people didn’t make it to the end of January — but I did. So I carried on. And on.

And now here I am, over five years later, still doing this for my own amusement more than anything else, but also as a means of self-expression, catharsis, stress-relief or simply a place to enthuse about things I’m excited about when no-one else wants to listen. I do that last one a lot.

The last five years have been a rocky road, and not in the pleasant chocolatey way. I’m still in the midst of a fairly unpleasant time of my life thanks to not currently having a regular source of income after a series of unfortunate and horrible episodes of being screwed over, though hopefully the income situation will change soon following some recent events.

I live in a house that I own with my fiancee Andie; we’re getting married in June of this year. We have two rats called Clover and Socks. We would like either a cat or a dog, but haven’t decided which yet, and figure the former in particular might be an unwise choice while the rats are still around — which hopefully they will be for at least a little while yet.

I’m a musician. Piano is my first instrument, and recently I actually bought my first real (albeit cheap and slightly battered) piano, having been getting by on an electric piano for the last few years — it’s just not the same. I also play the clarinet and saxophone; just recently, I’ve been doing some clarinet teaching for the first time in years in some local primary schools. While sort of fun, it’s also been reminding me why I don’t want to go back to classroom teaching ever — oh, yes, I’m a qualified classroom teacher with a specialism in music.

I play a lot of Final Fantasy XIV. My character’s name is Amarysse Jerhynsson, and you can find her on the Ultros server. To my surprise, Andie started playing a little while back and now possibly plays even more than I do, even coming raiding with me on Sunday nights.

I love Japanese games. I often celebrate them on this blog, but also write about them in more detail on my other site MoeGamer. I set up MoeGamer after being laid off from Eurogamer offshoot USgamer last year. I don’t get to update it as often as I’d like to — at least partly because lots of Japanese games are pretty long and I like to have beaten them before I write about them in detail! — but it provides a means of continuing the thing I enjoyed best about my time at USgamer: my weekly JPgamer column, in which I regularly enthused about the Japanese games that other publications ignored at best, ridiculed at worst.

Aside from Final Fantasy XIV, I am currently playing Hyperdevotion Noire and Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus on Vita. I am absolutely loving both. Noire is a surprisingly competent strategy RPG (or unsurprisingly, if you’re more familiar with developer Sting than I am) featuring characters who have become firm favourites over the last couple of years. Senran Kagura, meanwhile, continues the series’ tradition of blending enjoyably cheeky fanservice with genuinely good stories about the nature of good and evil, what it means to be a shinobi and how you go about finding your place in the world.

I am fat. I have recently started attending Slimming World sessions and have so far lost over 2 stone in 10 weeks, so that’s going quite well. I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep up that pace, but if I can get even vaguely close to my self-imposed target I’ll be happy.

I am depressed, and have lost at least one job as an indirect result of this. Recently, I finally plucked up the courage to go to the doctor and talk about it. The doctor complimented me on my thoughtful, philosophical attitude towards it — she caught me on a good day — and prescribed me some anti-anxiety meds. I can’t say whether or not they’re actually doing anything yet, but, well, baby steps and all that.

To the person who came to this blog by searching for “video games with a lot of pantyshots”, may I recommend the Dead or Alive series, Rival Schools on the PSone, Senran Kagura, and any visual novel that errs on the side of “eroge” without getting into weird shit.

To the person who came to this blog by searching for “huniepop kyu”, this is for you.

To the people who have been following along for the last 1900 days, thanks for indulging me for so long. To the people who have joined me recently, hello, welcome, and perhaps you understand me a little better now.

1899: Continued Shrinkage

Slimming World tonight, and I’m pleased to report that I lost another 3.5lb this week, which puts me in the “Club 10” category; I’ve lost 10% of what my body weight was when I started. If I can keep at or below this weight for 10 weeks, I get a free week of membership: a small reward, but an incentive nonetheless.

I’m pleased at how well I’ve managed to stick with it so far. The fact that the “diet” itself isn’t anywhere near as restrictive as a lot of other plans has helped me maintain my motivation to keep with it. I can continue to eat many of the things I enjoy, so long as they’re prepared appropriately — in most cases, this means substituting oil for low-calorie cooking spray, which I haven’t noticed having a particularly big impact on flavour. It obviously rules out things like deep-frying, which is a shame as there are certain things — hash browns are one — which are unquestionably superior when deep-fried compared to baked, but it’s something I can live without.

Or rather, I don’t necessarily have to live without these things so long as I pay attention to their “syn” values. Syns are abstract values that I believe are somewhat tied to calorific content, but also seem take into account things like sugar, fat and so on. The pronunciation of the name is perhaps a little misleading — they’re not “sins”, but rather short for “synergy” in that they provide controlled doses of the parts of a balanced diet that are easy to let run away with themselves — things like the aforementioned fats and sugars. We need these things to function — we need calories, too — but having too much of anything is where problems start. By limiting “syn” intake to 5-15 a day — I normally err towards the 15 mark, since I still enjoy my food — it’s much easier to keep a handle on what’s going in. And that, in turn, helps the weight continue to fall off: since I’ve started, which was, I believe, about 10 weeks ago, I haven’t had a single week where I haven’t lost weight as yet. I’m sure it’ll happen eventually — every week I expect to have reached that plateau and have to start working a bit harder — but for now, the efforts I’m making are being rewarded.

And that’s a good feeling. At a time in my life where I can’t honestly say things have been going particularly “well” — though things are marginally better than they have been thanks to me getting some sporadic work here and there — it’s nice to have one thing where I’m consistently and regularly having the opportunity to genuinely celebrate some success. And I’m pleased that the Slimming World group I’m a member of — as with most Slimming World groups, from what I’m given to understand — is more than happy to celebrate that success and keep me motivated to continue.

That and the fact I tried a pair of jeans on earlier that I couldn’t do up a few months ago and they went on easily.