A bit late, but better late than never?
I thought I’d write about the Final Fantasy concert – Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy.
Conducted by Arnie Roth and performed by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and the University of British Columbia Opera Ensemble, the concert took place on October 8 at the Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver.
It’s a bit of a long review, so please click below for the rest of the article.
In my last article, I wrote about the UBC Anime Club at their annual recruitment event: Clubs Days.
This article will be a continuation, covering the said clubs Icebreaker event which happened on September 25.
The article is a bit long and image-heavy, so please click below to read the rest.
Only a few days left in September, and that means it’s been about 3-4 weeks since the start of a new school year in North America. As for my alma mater–or shall I say my school, it’s crunch time for clubs with their membership recruitment.
So today’s article is on the UBC Anime Club at AMS Clubs Days, which went on from September 23rd through 25th at the University of British Columbia (UBC).
Slightly image-heavy, please click below to read the rest of the article.
I just wrote a review on Trash Panic a few days ago, but the review today is on a slightly arranged version (available at PlayStation Store Japan) called “100-yen GOMIBAKO.”
As the name suggests, the cost is 100yen, which will give you 3 credits, just like an arcade game. with 1 credit, you’ll be able to play up until end of Stage 3.
There are 2 courses: the “Regular Gomibako” and the “Harden Steel Gomibako.” The “Regular” course is just like the normal Trash Panic where you’d play with the blue garbage can. The “Harden Steel” on the other hand is, as the official website suggests, for “complete beginners.” That’s no lie, as it’s much easier to crash the garbage, and it’s pretty cool to see how easily garbage would burn or decompose.
Given the greatly reduced difficulty level and how pretty much anyone can enjoy the destruction of garbage (which certainly is the beauty of this game in my humble opinion), 100-yen GOMIBAKO seems like a better deal than the normal version, but this isn’t the only pro side of this version. Completing “Regular” will earn you some reward items you can use in PlayStation Home (determined by score and rating upon completion), and completing “Harden Steel” will earn you the “Harden Steel Can,” an item which is extremely difficult to earn in the normal version of the game. However, you must have a save file for the normal Trash Panic to earn the “Harden Steel Can” (meaning you had to have purchased Trash Panic first, create a save file, and then play 100-yen).
If you have an account with PlayStation Store Japan, and are debating whether to buy Trash Panic or not, I would suggest trying out the 100-yen GOMIBAKO first. As I mentioned earlier, 100 yen will get you 3 credits, so spend a credit to try it out, and if you like it, purchase the normal version and use the remaining credits to earn the rewards. Unlike an arcade, you don’t have to use up all 3 credits in one go.
If you have an account with the North American PlayStation Store, you could probably consider yourself lucky, since there is a playable demo of Trash Panic available (which, by the way, is not something offered in its Japanese counterpart).
As I was browsing through PlayStation Store (Japan), I noticed that this particular game was on sale as part of a campaign to celebrate the release of the slim PS3 (note: it was a limited time offer until Sept. 17, 2009; the price is now back to the original).
I’ve been curious about this game for a while, and this stuck me as a perfect opportunity for purchase.
The concept of the game is quite simple: trash falls from top of the screen, you chuck them in the trash can until you reach a certain amount.
However, it does drive your brain cells nuts to an extent, as it calls for usage of various techniques in order to cram more stuff into the can before it starts overflowing: you can “crash” the trash either by dropping them from up high or by hitting other trash already in the can, set trash on fire using a source of fire (cigarettes, torch) and flammable objects (toilet paper, oil), or decompose them by throwing in a special item into water which triggers decomposition.
At the end of each stage, you’ll either be rated as an EGO Player (by using techniques that harm the environment, such as burning) or an ECO player (by using eco-friendly techniques such as decomposition). This seems to me as if it’s a bit of a reflection on the recent ECO-movement (ie. preservation of environment, recycling/reusing materials, etc) that’s somewhat prominent in not only Japanese society (of where this game originates from), but also in North-American society (just how many of you carry one of those reusable grocery bags nowadays?)
The game uses a motif like trash, which is something we see commonly in our daily lives, and preserves its original characteristics, and even tweaks with the background (such as the shelves in the office) as you “compact” the trash, which looks rather realistic to me. Yet, you also see a rather nonsensical side when you end up seeing completely random objects in a stage (eg. katanas, dynamite, and fish lying around in an office), which enhances the amusement factor of the game.
Overall, the game is fun – smashing things in to pieces and blowing up random objects, how can that not be fun? However, I do want to note that this might be a bit of a tough game for beginners, given that even the easiest level (“SWEETS” in the Japanese version) is hard to beat. Also… might I be the only one thinking that the trophies are rather hard to achieve from this game?
On August 21, I went to the “The DNA of Sunday/Magazine” Exhibit held at the Kawasaki City Museum.
This was a special exhibit held to commemorate the 50th anniversaries of Weekly Shonen Sunday and Weekly Shonen Magazine. With full support of Shogakukan (for Sunday) and Kodansha (for Magazine), the exhibit displayed works by the top artists that represent each magazine. I believe it was as valuable an exhibit as the “Shojo Manga Power” Exhibit which was held before. (especially given the rareness of an opportunity to see close-ups of hand-drawn manuscripts – of which you can even see how the artist scraped or layered screentones)
After purchasing a ticket at the entrance and entering the exhibit, the hallway was decorated with artworks from both Sunday and Magazine, dating from its very first volume to the present. Unlike a simple timeline with dates and names of works, it contained images of main characters from each of the works.
It was exciting to see characters from back in the days. I think it was very well done.
The next area after passing through the timeline hallway is the main exhibit space.
First, I was greeted by 2 autographed statues (shaped like a G-pen), 1 from each magazine. Most of the autographs were indecipherable, though it became clear who it was written by from the illustration drawn by it or the characters incorporated in the autograph – I suppose this is something to expect from a manga artist.
The exhibit was comprised of 4 sections:
- manuscript displays along the walls
- a timeline denoting notable manga works and popular items from the corresponding time period, along with a display of character goods and other related items, which loosely surrounded the center area
- the center area containing a display panel with a commentary on Sunday and Magazine by Fusanosuke Natsume (organizer of this exhibit), and a lineage tree of different genres shaped like a DNA model.
- close to the exit was a space containing the history of interactions between the Tokiwa-so group and the editors, Rumiko Takahashi and Mitsuru Adachi’s favorite items and notebooks containing their ideas, and display panels explaining both Sunday and Magazine‘s chief editors’ work style
It seemed as though these section did not have as much correlation among each other. The valuable manuscripts, materials giving background information of each era, and items which reminisce the artist’s workspace all provide excellent resources, and for such kind of an exhibit it was very interesting and remarkable, though the connection between each section seemed somewhat weak. Specifically, the manuscript display could have had a bit more of a twist.
The items were displayed in a rather basic method of arranging notable works in a chronological order. The captions lacked information, and without prior knowledge, it may be difficult for some to understand the correlation among works. Personally, I would have liked to see the manuscripts along with the DNA model in the center area, as it would have been easier to understand the display. It was too bad they were a bit far from each other.
Another note about the caption: it would have been nicer if it indicated what materials were used to produce the manuscripts (eg. copic, color ink, CG), especially for the colored illustrations. This might be a demand likely coming from the otaku population, but the techniques and the tools used to produce manga is something specific to the Japanese, and I’m sure many of the audience are interested in finding out how their idol manga artists draw their manga, so it was somewhat disappointing to see that such information was lacking.
I’ve been listing all the points of criticism thus far, but personally, I was quite content to have been able to see the original manuscripts up close. For the artists who do everything on paper, it was especially nice to see techniques such as touched-up details and traces of cutting and pasting.
Going into a bit of detail with regards to manuscripts, I’d like to make a note about the treatment of digital manuscripts as a display item. For this exhibit, they were printed on paper, autographed by the artists, and was put on display. Since the manga media is meant to be reproduced, giving authorization on the basis of displaying at a museum or an art gallery is a rather difficult issue. An “original” manuscript, may be perceived as a one-and-only piece of item, given how they may contain materials that would not appear in the reproduction, such as specific instructions for printing or traces of correction. For a paper-based manuscript, it would not be difficult to claim that it is a one-and-only type of item. However, for a digital-based manuscript, it can be replicated or printed as many times as needed. This then brings the issue of whether if it is worthy of display. For this particular exhibit, such issue is resolved through the process of autographing, though it would be interesting to see how facilities that intend to specialize in storing/displaying manga would go about preserving the authenticity of these manuscripts.
Overall, the fact that such a large volume of manuscripts can be observed in one place seems to be highest point of this exhibit. Even if they had to be limited to the notable works, it is rare to be able to experience visually the 50 years of history–the changes in the artistic style which reflect the audience’s preference, the changes in theme, and the sophistication of style–of the two major manga magazines, Sunday and Magazine.
It appears that they’ll later be moving to Kyoto, so for those living in the Kansai area, this might be worth viewing.
“Going My Way Sub-culture” is a blog by Yuuri Kirie and Haruka Kidokoro. We have no intention of understanding each other and we throw each other random ideas here and there, while we post event reviews and commentaries on anime, games, and manga.
Our motto is doing whatever, in the way we like it.
If this style suits your liking, feel free to stick around and have a look 