Wonder Trade Chirstmas

Last Christmas, a few of the Pokemon players on Reddit got together and said " Hey, why don't we breed pokemon for the younger kids that will be getting X and Y for Christmas, and then put these Pokemon up on Wonder Trade." A lot of the community joined in and made Wonder Trade Christmas happen. This past November, Pokemon Omeg Ruby and Alpha Sapphire were released in November, meaning that a lot of kids will be getting one or both of these games for Christmas, and the community wants to give them some Pokemon to start out their journey with. Now the goal of Wonder Trade Christmas is not necessarily to put up 6 IV perfect nature Pokemon up(you can if you wish) but to put up pokemon that would catch a little kid's eye, such as starters or Eevee's or in some special cases legendaries. For most people though, they'll try to send out Pokemon with egg moves or hidden abilities so that they'll be something special. This Christmas, I will be participating in Wonder Trade Christmas, sending out 3-5 IV Oshawatts that know Night Slash, and egg move, for all those little kids(and adults) getting  Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. I might also send out a box of 2-5 IV Nidorans of both genders, some with the egg moves Venoshock and Poison Tail to add a little joy to a kid's Christmas.

So please, this Christmas, while you are enjoying your presents and egg nog, try and breed a few Pokemon that can be sent on Wonder Trade to help a young boy or girl start their journey to become a Pokemon Master.I believe it is our duty as the generation that grew up on Pokemon to help those just beginning their journey and give them a little gift that might make a difference in their game.

Merry Christmas!!

Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire.

I admit, when I heard Generation 3 was going to be remade, I honestly had some doubts of how they would handle it being on the 3DS and how they would mix together the mega-evolutions into Hoenn. Worst yet, they were introducing new mega-evolutions into Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire (ORAS) which made me skeptical. How would this affect game play? Would it alter the games I once loved and still have Pokemon from? Although there were some differences, these games still retained a lot of the same joy as the originals did ten years ago.


Seeing Hoenn in 3D really brought back a lot of memories from when I first started playing. The intro of Professor Birch in the Original Gameboy Advance graphics really hit it home for me, and this isn't even 5 minutes in. All of the locations look almost exactly as they did in Ruby and Sapphire except in 3D. When you dive now, if there is no grass, you can see the Pokemon peeking up at you from in the trenches, and riding on the back of Latios/Latias is an amazing sight to see. Having better graphics than Ruby and Sapphire did ten years ago enabled me to see more of what they were trying to do, such as Flannery's gym being a hot spring, or design of Tate and Liz's gym looking more psychic like.  Now,  one of my gripes is Mauville City, which used to be simplistic, now has changed into a mega-mall style city, that honestly was a pain to navigate.Another weird issue is the fact the transitions between the routes was not smooth like they were in original Ruby and Sapphire. It made the routes easier to navigate but having the awkward transitions broke the immersion for me. 

The elements they brought from Pokemon X and Y helped the game progress a lot faster than it did in Ruby and Sapphire. The experience share constantly being on made it so that I didn't have to worry about raising the one weak Pokemon on my team by throwing it out in front of my team. Although this is a constant complaint in the Pokemon world, they made it so you can toggle it on or off, like in X or Y. The primordial evolutions helped with the story line to help show Kyogre's and Groudon's true power in the past. Kyogre's Primordial Sea and Groudons Desolate Land are amazing and add a new power to them. The mega-evolutions keep their distance for the most part but they make their return at the Delta Episode.

The post game not lacking in things to do, unlike X and Y. The Delta Episode was full of fast passed action, with Zinnia, a young girl, goes around taking everyone's mega stones in hopes of reviving Rayquaza. After catching Rayquaza, you get a chance to catch the mysterious Deoxys. Being able to catch Deoxys, a former event only Pokemon, made me really excited due to the fact back when I was playing Ruby and Sapphire, I couldn't get Deoxys legitimately.

The new Mega-evolutions introduced in ORAS added a bit of hype to the game for me, although some of the Mega-evolutions didn't fit the theme of Hoenn.  Mega-Altaria and Mega-Sharpedo really brought the theme of Hoenn home, along with Mega-Rayquaza. They also brough up the starter Mega-Evolutions, although the artistic design of Swampert was not pleasing where as Mega-Blaziken and Mega-Sceptile seemed to ooze power.The addition of Mega-Audino and Mega-Slowbro felt awkward but I was glad to see a Generation 5 Pokemon get a mega evolution.

All in all, I'd recommend these games to any pokemon fan despite their flaws(and too much water), young or old, whether it is their first Pokemon game, or if they are a Pokemon master, any person will have fun with these games.

Aikatsu(Season 1)

On my quest to find cutesy anime, I thought I hit the tragic end at one point in my life. All that felt like was left was Sailor Moon and maybe one or two that haven't been subbed due to their obscurity. However, through reddit, I stumbled upon a cutesy anime that not only quenched my thirst for cutesy anime, but also was also perfect for my thirst for idol anime.

  Our story starts off with a first year middle schooler ,Hoshimiya Ichigo, a happy go lucky girl who loves food. One day, she and her friend, Kiriya Aoi, a studious girl and the same age as Ichigo, go to see super idol, Kanzaki Mizuki in concert. Ichigo is so mesmerized by Mizuki's performance that she decides to transfer into Starlight Academy, a school known for making famous idols such as Kanzaki Mizuki. After getting accepted into Starlight Academy, Ichigo and  Aoi embark on Idol Activities, or Aikatsu, to help her train as an Idol. Along the way, they meet Shibuki Ran, a model who loves the brand Spicy Ageha, Toudou Yurika, a tsundere girl who likes to pose as a vampire, and Arisugawa Otome, a hyper active girl that loves sweets. Together, they embark on various aikatsu in hopes of surpassing Kanzaki Mizuki. 

The story is pretty typical: you have your happy go lucky main character who has an dream and then you have her best friend that will try her best to talk sense into her. It is almost episodic in nature, however, it does a lot of continuity, which is nesacery to help show that Ichigo is progressing as an idol. At the start of the anime, it shows that Ichigo is unsure of whether or not she wants to be an idol, but as she gets more involved with aikatsu, she grows to love being an idol. Along the way, she meets various friends, all with different personalities and they help her grow as idol. The main progression of the plot is measure by time, i.e various holidays and events. To be honest, for a show aimed at little girls, the plot was not too bad.

The characters had various personalities. We have happy go lucky Ichigo, the studious Aoi, the tsundere Ran as our main three. However, we meet Otome, a eccentric girl in the same year as Ichigo, Yurika, a girl pretending to be a vampire and of course Kanzaki Mizuki, a mature girl who is the schools top idol. The characters are stereotypical I will admit, but I enjoyed them none the less. One thing that does make me sad is the fact during that I couldn't bring my self to get attached to any of the characters due to there was so many rotating in and out around the main cast. Another problem is that the characters of the cast are distinguishable, they feel like they all have the same personality at the base. Otome and Ichigo feel like the same person except for one throws English around in the middle of her sentences.

The art for this anime came in two styles: the regular anime art and the CGI used during the performances. The regular art was great; everything seemed well animated with very little flaws. Each character looked distinguishable, and were most of the time well drawn. The CGI was a bit of a miss for me because while they were dressed super cute for the performances, the girls them selves looked a bit weird. I also felt like the CGI helped with the appeals these girls were trying to make, but in the end, just felt like it was over  done. However the transition into the CGI scenes came as almost a magical girl style fashion.

The music for the first season of Aikatsu was pretty good. The songs used in every episode were upbeat and happy. The opening and endthemes were well done and were even decent enough to be used as performance songs. My only complaint was that the songs did get repetitive but it gets better in later seasons.

Over all, I enjoyed marathoning this anime. I couldn't wait to see what it had in store for me next, and honestly I was not disappointed with the first season of Aikatsu. Was it perfect? No, but don't let that discourage you because this anime is worth watching despite the flaws.

Godzilla (2014)

Although anime might be huge in America today, that was not the first thing that came over from Japan. In the 1950's,there was a Japanese movie the show cased a huge reptile tearing up Tokyo in epic fights against these big monsters called Kaijuu called Godzilla. There have been sequels and even an American remake that most people are trying to forget. However, Americans have tried their hand again in a remake of these Japanese films,and surprisingly, it turned out decently.

Our plot starts out in the Philippines in 1999 where a group of explorers discover a unusual uranium deposit that seemed to stronger once it was exposed to air. Underground, there was a massive  fossil, bigger than any animal known to man but in the fossil held an embryonic sac, which was the source of the uranium. The next scene cuts to Janjira, Japan where its a normal day as always, except the power plant where one of our main characters, Joe, works at starts reporting tremors from inside the earth. Everyone thinks it's just an earthquake, but when the power plant collapses with Joe's wife inside, he is convinced that it was not just a normal earthquake. Our plot after that point jumps to the year 2014 in San Francisco where Joe's son, Ford grew up with out any problems and has come home from a military tour over seas. However, on his first night home, he gets a phone call from Japan from his dad saying that his dad was arrested from going into a restricted area to get the data from fourteen years ago back. After the police arrest him, he meets up with one of his old co workers from the power plant and as it turns out, where the power plant use to be, there is now a pulsating cocoon belonging to the winged creature called muto which feeds off radiation. Switching scenes, there is another cocoon in Nevada which hatched into a bigger, however wingless muto. As the two travel on their way to meet up, the alpha predator,Godzilla is hot on the muto's trail, traveling across the Pacific, to cross paths with the female muto from Nevada for an epic battle over San Fransico. 

I will admit to that I haven't seen any of the Godzilla movies previously. I went in expecting two hours of monster fighting with maybe a little bit of plot thrown in. However, there was substantial lack of of monster fighting in this movie. When Godzilla him self only shows up three times, I felt like this was a movie more about the humans rather that Godzilla.This movie tried to play on the drama side and tried to show the human's side of the story, which did give our main characters a chance to develop. But when it tried too hard to pull the emotional strings a bit too hard. Another thing that irked me about the plot was the fact they pulled too many plot convenience strings, such as Ford falling off a bridge , being knocked out, and waking up just in time when the military troops walk by.   

The movies tried to play up the human character but they honestly came up as bland. Ford, our main character for majority of the movie was our typical marine guy coming home from a tour over seas. There is nothing that makes him stand out, and often times, I feel like if his character was written out, it might have been a little less bland. His dad, Joe, was slightly more interesting because he was that one guy who claimed to have a clue what was going on, but was looked at like he was crazy the whole entire movie. Unfortunately, all of the other human characters ended up kind of bland and forgettable. Godzilla himself only appeared three times but some things were explained, such as he was the alpha predator and the Muto were his prey.

Overall, I was entertained with this movie. Granted it had a generous amount of flaws,but seeing the big monster fight at the end almost made up for the fact that the human "character development" took up more time than it should have. I will say that the experience of going to the movie theater and having people cheer when Godzilla showed up was a blast. I would recommend it if you can over look some plot holes and enjoy colossal monsters fighting over the city. 

Kami-Sama Dolls

Lately, I've taken to watching anime with a few good friends of mine. Between getting to spend time together and watching anime, for me it is a win-win situation. We usually try to find stuff that is somewhat serious but also a good watch and that is entertaining. When I stumbled upon Kami-Sama Dolls, I was hoping this was the serious anime we were looking for, maybe with a bit of mecha and super natural thrown in. I could not have been more wrong sadly.

Our plot starts off with our main character, Kyouhei, moving into the city from a secluded small town in the mountains. In the small town, they have people called Seki, and they control these dolls that are revered as gods and sometimes use them to fight other people. While in the city, Kyohei and his friend, Hibino, come across a pile of bodies one night and immediately his childhood friend,Aki, shows up and Kyohei tries to blame the murder on him. As the plot progresses, it turns into a mess of trying to figure out who killed all of those people, as well a mess of back stories. Amongst the back stories, is the reason why Aki became exiled from the village and the beginnig of the story of a doll with no seki.

The plot for this anime has one major problem: pacing. You can clearly tell they wanted twenty four episodes but they were only granted thirteen. They crammed so much into one episode it felt like each episode was an hour long when in reality they were half that. Another issue was while they crammed so much in one episode it felt like it was just dragging on and on, it felt like nothing ever truely got accomplished. 

The characters somehow are worse than the plot. Our main character,Kyohei, is hinted to have been a really powerful Seki when he held the title later in the series, but we never see evidence of that. He just comes off as every other male main character I have ever encountered. His little sister,Utao, took over his position as Seki, but while she should have been powerful, she just comes off as childish and gets angry over stupid things. Worst yet, she was so childish and innocent that everyone fawned over her to the point that i felt awkward watching those scenes. Kyohei's love interest, Hibino, had one the flattest personalities I have ever seen. Her character development began and ended in boobs. When she gets kidnapped, the Mahiru, Kyohei's stalker, just knows her as the girl with the boobs, nothing else. Aki, our main antagonist, is supposed to be this misunderstood supposed pyschopath, but he usually just end up being bland as ever.

The art was another pitfall for this anime. Our characters look bland and if I didn't know they were our main characters, they would have faded into the background. Another qualm my friend and I had was the fact that Hibino's boobs seemed to change sizes depending on the shot. Now I do understand angles, but they seemed to change sizes by the frame. The backgrounds them selves were nothing spectacular to be honest. The only redeeming quality about the art was the art and animation of the dolls, and even that was poor. 

Over all,although usually when I watch a bad anime, I can enjoy it. However, with Kami-sama Dolls, the lack of enjoyment made this anime even more boring. It just took its self too seriously, making this anime even worse. 

Nagi no Asukara

I will not deny, I love movies and shows with under water scenes or that take place under water. It is something about these shows that draw me to them, and they often do not disappoint. In Fall 2013 season, a new anime started airing and it had the mystique of under the sea written all over it. Nagi no Asukara appeared to be a beautifully animated work of art, and it also appeared to be right up my alley for an anime.

Nagi no Asukara starts off with a group of  middle school kids, Hikari, Manaka, Chisaki, and Kaname, from underwater who have just found out that their old school is closing and they must transfer schools. Since there isn't any other schools under the sea, they decide to go to a school on the surface. Before they start school, Manaka gets caught up in a fishing net by a soon to be classmate named Tsumugu and almost near instantly falls in love with him. However, the peace that the group from under the sea and even the surface can not last forever and there is something omninous waiting for them on the horizon. 

The plot is very character driven as it is a drama anime. Even though the begin all, end all problem is an external source from outside the characters,name the fact that they are threatened with the fact that they might be going to sleep for a very long time and might wake up long after everyone they have ever known on the surface has passed away. Also, within the anime, there was a time skip, whichshowed how everyone one the surface had change, but yet the people from underwater hadn't changed one bit. The second arc, which also revolved around finding Manaka's ability to love, was also decent, but in some ways it felt like it went on too long.

However, the drama at some points makes no sense, especially since Chisaki keeps flipping back and forth between the male cast. Hikari starts off as a headstrong character, but he eventually learns to mature and show his soft side, especially in a time of crisis. Kaname is the other male member from the underwater cast, and while he is plot relevant, he usually gets shoved into the background until he is brought up again but then he just disappears into the back ground. Manaka is an interesting character as she is portrayed to be the love interest of Hikari, but she is completely ditzy and ends up falling in love with the boy from the surface, Tsumugu. Are these characters the most original characters out there? No, but for the most part they were decent characters. The one exception lays in Chisaki because I have a feeling that she knew she was a side character in comparison to Hikari and Manaka, but she kept trying to butt her way into the story.Miuna's character became more developed after the time skip was done, but by the end of it, I honestly felt sorry for her because Chisaki, Sayu and Manaka ended up with their own special someone, while she sacrificed her happiness for Hikari. 


The art for this anime is actually pretty amazing. The underwater scenes were so well animated it honestly took my breath away. There is quality animation for the surface scenes as well, but the real quality comes from underwater. All the characters has great character designs,except for Iam still wondering what the little feather things are behind Manaka's ears. Another part of the art style for the characters I liked was actually the eyes of the people from the sea. The eyes were such a pretty blue that I couldn't help but to admire them.

Now was Nagi no Asukara the perfect anime? No it wasn't. It lacked some consistency about the Ena, the layer of skin that covers the people from the sea's skins to enable them to breathe underwater. Also, as I have stated before, certain characters irked me , but despite its flaws, I enjoyed the emotional roller coaster that this anime put me through.

Kill La Kill

While I was at Katsucon this previous month, not only was Card Captor Sakura recommended to me, another anime was recommended to me through the Anilplex panel. At this panel, they show cased Nekomonogatari Bluray set and an anime called Magi and Vividred  and this one anime that had been garnering a lot of attention from fans called Kill La Kill. I heard about it, but until the panel really changed my mind, I was not originally going to watch it, but through a few people talking me into it, I eventually did, and honestly, I am glad I did.



The plot for Kill La Kill is simple: Matoi Ryuuko is seeking revenge on who ever killed her father. With her, she wields a back talking school uniform named Senketsu that gives her enormous power and makes her near indestructible and half of a scissor blade thats capable of cutting through anything. She goes to Honnouji Academy, where Kiryuuin Satsuki, an oppressive student council leader who has her own army of super power uniforms trying to beat Ryuuko into the ground. Along the way, she meets upwith Mankanshouku Mako, an energetic girl who is hyper active and love Ryuuko no matter what. Together, they go on the quest to defeat Satsuki to try and get her revenge on the person who killed her father.

The characters for me were lovable and well written. Even Kiryuuin Satsuki had her redeemable qualities, even though she was trying to kill our beloved Ryuuko. The Four Devas under her, Jakuzure Nonon, Sanagayama Uzu, Gamagoori Ira, and Inumuta Houka, had some funny and awesome moments as well as well as the highest super power uniform under the God Robes that Satsuki and Ryuuko possess. Mako was energetic through out the series and the way she was over dramatic in explaining things kept the series on a positive note, even the world was going to hell in a hand basket. Even the character that terrified me to no end, Harime Nui, had her awesome moments because, like Mako, was energetic and happy in all situations.


The animation for this show was unique in its own little way. It felt like it had a hand drawn feel to it, and when Mako starting getting excited and started "spinning" she actually looked like she was flipping around. The action scenes were well animated, and the whole battle sequences felt over the top like in Guran Lagaan. Every time they used their attacks, there was text, which also helped with the over the top feel, and even added for some hilarity as well.The uniforms had almost their own little transformation sequences, making it feel like a magical girl. The uniform that Ryuuko had, I will admit, was skimpy, but it is not worth the controversy. The outfits were all distinguishable and related to their powers, which was interesting and, I will admit, pretty cool.

Overall, I am glad I gave this anime a chance because it was not as serious I thought it was going to be. I will admit, I am sad that it is over, it was an enjoyable ride and unlike most anime, it wrapped up everything nicely at the end. Studio Trigger did a great job at animating this, and I am looking forward to what they have in the future.

Card Captor Sakura

When I went to Katsucon in February, I ended up cosplaying as Sakura from Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicles for a panel I was a part of.   On this trip, despite all the things that happened, for better or worse, I was recommended to watch the anime that Sakura her self was originally a part of. Now, I had known that there was an anime called Card Captor Sakura by seeing crossover parodies of it on youtube, but I had not been originally interested in it due to the fact that it was seventy episodes long. However, the guys in the panel convinced me to watch it, and I am honestly glad I did.

The plot for Card Captor Sakura is pretty decent for a magical girl show. Kinomoto Sakura stumbles upon the Book of the Clow, which holds these magical cards that have a variety of abilities, from Fire to Dash, and she accidentally releases the cards from the book. However, she is given the card Windy at first to help her retrieve the cards, and with the Guardian of the Clow, Keroberos, help. Along the way, she meets a boy by the name of Syaoran who is also after the Clow Cards, and they eventually team up trying to retrieve all of the cards before they wreak havoc on the world.

The characters in this were actually pretty decent. Our lead, Sakura, is sometimes an air head, and by no means perfect, which makes for a changing character. She displays a lot of traites for a fourth grade girl, such as love interest, even though it isnt typical for a fourth grade girl to fall in love with a high schooler, the dislike of school work and wanting to play, but she also displays the mentality of when the going gets tough, the tough gets going. Her friend, Tomoyo, who accompanies her on the card retrieval missions, videotapes her and make out fits, and the interactions between her and Sakura are quite interesting, but she to me is a stacitc character for most of the series. Syaoran Li is one of the most interesting characters in the cast, to perfectly honest. He goes from this little brat who is stalked by his fiancee, Meilin, to a strong independent boy who can let his soft side through a bit. Meilin was a character that was introduced mid season, but when I first saw her in the anime, she honestly annoyed me, but as time went on, she became quite the decent character. The highschoolers in the cast, Yukito, Sakura's love interest for majority of the series, and Touya, Sakura's older brother, are ever present during the beginning, especially Yukito, but while they might not be too important during the beginning, their roles steadily become more important as the show goes on.

The art for this series was pretty decent, considering the anime started in 1998 and ended in 2000. One of my biggest quelms about the animation in this anime is the fact that they reused some of the animation, such as Sakura putting on her gloves to go skating, and even the whole her skating to school sequence was reused a few times. One of the odd things about Card Captor Sakura from most magical girl anime was the fact it did not have a transformation sequence. Her outfit changed every time she went to capture a card because Tomoyo made the outfits for her. I did like the art style of Card Captor Sakura because it reminded me of how far anime art style has come, and even though they reused some sequences of the anime, I did not mind because they did not feel forced into the show; they felt completely natural.

The plot overall was a decent point of the anime. It actually came in two parts: Sakura capturing the clow cards and becoming the master of the Clow Cards, and the part where she becomes the master and has to figure out a way to use the cards that are now hers insteadof belonging to Clow Reed, the original owner of the cards. The first half was fantastic, even though in the beginning of the anime felt like it was moving too fast for itsown good. The second half the anime like it was tacked on last minute and it felt like the writers were just trying to give Sakura something to do to make a show. 

Overall, despite its flaws, I was still glad it was recommended to me.  It sometimes felt like it was magical girl, but also that it wasn't due to there were no set transformation sequences.If you haven't seen this yet, I highly recommend it.

Team Builder Live

If you haven't been keeping your eyes out, then you might have missed the two day beta test called team builder. Each region got two days to test out this beta over a ten day period. So how did Team builder comapre to the normal game mode that most of us have come to either love or hate?

First, what is team builder? IN the normal queues, you are randomly matched with people who want to play a whole variety of position's and in the pre game lobby, you say what you wanna play. This can cause fighting because you sometimes have the person that wanted to play the Attack Damage Carry and got stuck as the support. In team builder, before you even queue in, you actually pick the champion you want to play, then you pick the archetype like mage, support, tank, marksman, or assassin, then you pick the lane you want to play. You are then either team captain and choose the spots that you want played such as whether or not you have duo top or a jungler or you are placed into a queue where you are waiting for a team captain. Then the match queue,once both teams are made, proceeds as normal.

I did like team builder because you locked into the champion and posistion before queing in. It gave the chance to take a typical mid-laner top lane or a jungler bottom lane. Also, it helped eliminated the fighting of calling positions in the chat room and preventing confusion. It was also a good idea because you had the potential to meta break because if you wanted to play Sivir mid-lane, you you could play Sivir mid-lane almost no questions asked. You wanted to play Soraka as a tank? You could take Tankraka top lane.

Though it was supposed to be innovative in how the teams were made,  it was not without flaws. My main complaint was the fact I tried to be as meta breaking as possible,such as taking Fiddlesticks top lane(which worked quite well) but most people tried to stick to the meta as much as they possibly could. I wanted to see some shenanigans that would have made the game a lot more fun, but regardless if it was just the games I played, I wanted to see some form of meta breaking. Another complaint I read about online was the queue it self had some hiccups. It seemed there was a lack of team captains and too many people looking for captains. Even as team captain, I had some problems finding players to be honest, but I was also playing during a high point.

Honestly,I liked the idea of the team builder, due to the fact it could eliminate the painof trying to call positions. I hope to see this game mode return in the future as more than just a two day beta, or a permanent
game mode.

Doki Doki Precure

The magical girl genre, or mahou shoujo,  has always been a weakness of mine, Between the transformations,the fantasy elements presented in it, and the super powers, it has a lot in store for me. Usually, I love any magical girl,no question, but as it seems lately, they seem to be prettier for sure, but at what cost? Doki Doki Precure is very pretty to the eyes, but all it not glitter and roses with this anime.



Doki Doki Precure is like any other magical girl series plot wise.You have your group leader, Aida Mana, and your side Precures, Hishikawa Rikka, Kenzaki Makoto, aka Makopi, and Yotsuba Alice, and later on Madoka Aguri. Granted along the way, you have ultimate big bad guy, King Selfish, and his not so evil at times daughter, Regina, and the evil trio of Ira, Bel, and Mammo, but besides Regina and King Selfish himself, the rest just play the role of making the bad guy of the week appear, so in other words, a completely normal day in the life of mahou shoujo anime. 

The main focus of the any Precure series is indeed it characters,which in this series becomes a horrendous mistake.The mistake of which I am referencing is Aida Mana. In the early episodes, you can tell she has a pure heart and wants to do good, and that she is the center, but this become problematic later on. Throughout the series, you see that each of the characters has their own little flaws, which for the most part are forgotten as the series progresses, but as for Aida Mana, she is shown to have no flaws. She is student council president, she is athletic and she wants to do good, which isn't all bad,but it makes her into a static character. The other three Precures have their own little episodes, but any character development from these episodes, unless it's wanting to make friends with Regina, the daughter of the main villain, is almost completely ignored like the flaw didn't even exist in the first place.  Also, the anime seemsto have seemingly pointless side characters,such as Ai, the little baby found in an egg, and Joe,Queen Ange's fiance, who for the most of the series is not even present.

The art for this anime was its only saving grace honestly. The characters were well drawn out and the animation for the most part was decently smooth. Along with that, the transformation sequences were also very well done, but I, like most people, probably would have been disappointed other wise. The back ground characters emphasize the main cast by all having black hair in contrast to the pink hair or Mana,or the purple hair of Makoto.

Overall, Doki Doki precure is really only worth the watch if you are really into Precure or magical girl anime or have some time to kill. It started out with a whole lot of promise to be a decent magical girl anime in the beginning, but as the series went on, it felt like it could not sustain its self. Compared to the other Precure series, this one is weak and hopefully on the next series, they will be able to polish out the flaws. 

Another

Horror is a genre that many people seemed to be enthused with. Between the suspense of what might happen next or the jump scares that some movies use,or the combination of both, it is a very appealing genre. However, there are times when the suspense makes little to no sense or the jump scares are used so much it is repetitive and boring. The anime Another tries too hard to be suspenseful and while in some cases it succeeds, it doesn't quite get there.



The anime Another starts off with a kid named Sakakibara Kouichi that moves to the small town of Yomiyama due an issue with his lungs. At the hospital he is staying at,he meets up with a girl named Misaki Mei, a girl who is abnormally quiet and wears an eye patch over her left eye. When he transfers into the local school's class 3, Misaki Mei is in the class, but no one seems to notice her, even when he tries to draw attention to her. However, people in the class and their family members start dying from freak accidents, and as it turns out class 3 is cursed due to an extra person showing up on the class roster who in actuality is dead and it is up to class to figure out who is dead in order to stop the calamity. One of the charms used to keep the calamity from happening is for the class to make the class roster numbers right by acting like a person in the class does not exist, whether they're the ones that are dead or not.

The plot of this anime has so many holes it is not even funny. First of all, they say they can't ever get the desk count right at the beginning due to the person appearing randomly,and the fact that when the person does show up, memories get altered, but yet they know an extra person will appear. Another plot hole is the fact they even said in the anime and in the manga this curse is like a cell phone to a cell tower: if you move away from the town, the curse has little to no effect on you and almost everyone knows rumours of this curse though no one is allowed to know specifics outside class 3,so why don't the local people move out of the town? Also the part of no one allowed to know specifics is annoying because literally for the first five episodes Sakakibara is not allowed to know the exact curse but trying to find out because his classmates would not tell him the curse.  You can not tell someone in a show for a god amount of time with out sounding like complete idiots, and that's what happened in this show: his class mates not telling the information and basically being sketchy about was intriguing at first,but got redundant real fast. Worst yet, Misaki Mei knew who the dead person was,and she doesn't say anything.

The art of Another is actually pretty decent, given the abnormal amount of plot holes. The characters are well drawn, though my only complaint is yes you have your two main characters, but amongst other anime, the character designs are not unique. If you try to make the case for Misaki Mei, I might give you that one, but only because Takanashi Rikka's from Chunibyou demo Koi ga Shitai eye patch is on her right eye,nother left.  Another weird thing I noticed about the animation is at the beginning of the anime,the animation does random cuts to pictures of creepy dolls. This is not a SHAFT work, so the random cuts literally did nothing for me because at least SHAFT uses them tastefully; Another uses to the point I actually had to wonder if my video player was glitching.

The characters, like their designs, were not distinguishable or interesting. Misaki Mei is the most interesting character, and she doesn't even have that much of a presence. The classmates of Mei and Kouichi try their best to be interesting, but it turns into their bland and forgettable. In this anime everyone follows a ridiculous stereotype i.e. Misaki Mei is the quiet mysterious girl, Sakakibara is the boy that moves to a small town to recover from illness, the class representative, Akazawa, is a tsundere in a twisted sort of way. I do think this anime suffered from what I have to call "Game of Thrones Syndrome": Do not get too attached to the characters because they might die in the next episode.

Overall, I admit, I enjoyed the anime if only for the plot holes and the ridiculousness of the deaths. If I have taken any one thing away from this anime is the fact that panic will make people do things that are outside of their normal character. Otherwise, this anime,while it was trying to be serious, it became laughable by the end of how bad it actually was.

Hexakill

If you have been playing league recently, then you know that there is a new format called Hexakill. Instead of there being five champions on each team, there is now an extra person making it six vs six. I admit, when I heard about it, I was excited to try it out due to hey something other than Classic Summoners' Rift or ARAM, even though Hexakill is played on Summoners Rift. However, just because something is shiney and new does not mean that is all fun and games: Hexakill is sometimes annoying to play.


With there being an extra champion, that means there is a couple of options to dividing up the champions between lanes. You could do two at top lane, two at bottom lane, and two at middle lane, or you could go two top, two bottom, one middle and a jungle. During champion select during normal matches, especially with queuing in with random people, it is sometimes a mess calling positions, but everything can work itself out by the time champion select is over.In Hexakill however, the mess continues up until the game actually starts because half of the team favors the two in every lane and the other half goes with there being a jungler. While I have found in my experience that sending two in every lane is usually efficient, there is also great power in there being a jungle.

Another problem I have had with Hexakill is what type of champion to send where. In normal game mode, you send your tanks or bruisers top lane, like Nassus, Riven and Tryndmere;you send your Assassins middle lane, like Ahri,Fizz, and Katarina; and you send your Attack Damage Carry,or ADC, such as Sivir, Ashe and Caitlyn and your Support bottom lane, such as Soraka, Thresh or Leona. In that mix you could have a jungler, like Vi or Fiddlesticks, but it almost optional. However, in Hexakill, I have seen them send a tank and an Assassin top lane to disrupt the top lane and them to send tanks bot lane to give the ADC some support. I admit, the main problem is people keep trying to play it like they play Classic Rift during Hexakill due to the fact Hexakill is not classic Rift; Hexakill does not have a clear defined meta, which is also a good quality because it allows people to experiment. I admit, the combo of Nassus and Ahri top would have never happened in classic, but it an awesome combination due to Ahri charming and Nassus farming for the kill.

One of the fun things bout it though is experiment with different champion combos, like the Nassus-Ahri combo. For example if you do pick to have two middle lane champions, you can see how different champions interact with each other. It is kind of funny how mid just starts spamming combos and eventually gets there.

Speaking of experimenting, I feel a greater ease experimenting with different champions. I admit to experimenting with Syndra and Orianna the whole time while I do Hexakill. While you can experiment on Rift, people will flame you if you do bad, but in Hexakill, while there is flaming, the thing that makes it better is the fact that it's not a "real" format, meaning while you do get IP and EXP, its a fun format.It not competitive like it is on rift;it just exists,sorta like ARAM.

Overall, while I have had some bad experience trying to figure out Hexakill, I hope in the coming days, I will continue having fun playing League. I hope Riot can keep giving us these fun formats, such as Hexakill, All for One, Showdown, etc, and maybe keep them a bit longer.

A Few Words on the Banning of Sylvan Primordial

If you are an avid Elder Dragon Highlander, or EDH, player like me, then you know that there is anew card to the banned list: Sylvan Primordial from Gatecrash. Ironically, the card was actually designed for EDH to replace Primeval Titan, a six drop that said whenever Primeval Titan enter the battle fiend or attacks, search your library for two forest cards and put them into play. Now while Sylvan Primordial only triggered when it entered the battlefield, it could have still been a problem.

Although I have never used Sylvan Primemordial in EDH, I can see where some problems might arise such as reanimation or flickering, but there are other cards with much worse effects to animate to,such as Kokusho, the Evening Star. When i read Sylvan Primordial, it was intresting to see green get some destruction, even some land destruction;it doesn't destroy creatures.  Along with that is mana ramp, which green does very very well, although since Sylvan Primordial is a seven drop, i was doubting its usefulness. 

Overall, I am very very surprised it got banned in EDH, and Honestly , i don't think it deserved it, because it doesn't destroy creatures. 

Jigoku Shoujo

A few months ago, I kind of got desperate for a new anime to watch. I felt like I had watched every anime that had caught my eye and even a few anime that hadn't. But instead of giving into peer pressure to watch Attack on Titan, someone recommended an anime called Hell Girl, or Jigoku Shoujo. Now while I was skepticalon watching this,I decided to take a look at this anime.

The premise for the anime is simple:at midnight a website opens up called Hell Link. On this website, you can enter the name of the person you want to take revenge against, and Enma Ai,otherwise known as Jigoku Shoujo, will send them down to hell at the price that when you die, you will go to hell your self. Before Jigoku Shoujo sends the people to hell, she tortures them in the most bizarre ways possible, such as showing them their worst nightmares.

At the beginning of the anime, the anime comes of as very episodic, as in one problem, one episode and almost zero continuity. However, as the series goes on, you get introduced to a couple of characters named Shibata Hajime, a reporter who wants to investigate the mystery of these mysterious deaths, and his daughter, Shibata Tsugumi, a seven year old girl who has a mysterious connection with Enma Ai and can see who she comes to that wants revenge. These characters to me add a bit continuity to the series, because, because honestly, if had kept up its episodic pace, I think I would not have enjoyed the anime as much as I did. Also along the way, Enma Ai has her own companions: Wanyuudou, a mysterious old man that becomes the doll that has the red string, Hone Onna, the mysterious woman who accompanies Enma Ai and Ichimoku Ren,a young man who has one eye covered. 

Overall, I got a kick out of this anime,mostly because I feel the pain of wanting to take revenge on a person. However, it is interesting to note while Jogoku Shoujo hands them a doll with a red string, she does not untie the string her self; she allows the person wanting revenge to untie it to enter into the contract that will send both of them to hell. I like this idea because it allows the person to rethink the decision to enact revenge.

The art stylefor this anime is dark like the theme,but it is still well drawn. The characters' expressions are sometimes a bit over done,but other than that, I was fine with the animation. Also, I do like the fact that you could tell the main cast apart, but otherwise,it felt like the characters from the episodic episodes started looking the same after a bit.

Overall, I liked this anime due to its dark air and mystery. However, it had a nice solid end, but also left some strings untied, which should be tied up in season two I hope. 

Welcome to the Howling Abyss

So it has been a while,yes? All that aside, on my time off I have picked up a game you guys might familiar with called League of Legends, but more importantly the game mode known as ARAM.

Now, incase you're not familiar with ARAM,it stands for All Random All Mid. Your champion is selected at random from the champions you own and the ones that are free for that week. If you get a champion you really don't like, ypu can switch with a team mate provided you both have the champion or you can reroll and you earn rerolls by storing up points from playing ARAM. 

The all mid part refers to the fact that the Howling Abyss, unlike Summoners Rift, only has one lane. In this lane, you have two friendly turrets and two enemy turrets along with both teams have an inhibitor near the base and two turrets defending each nexus. Also wandering the map are creatures called Poros. These creatures neither help nor harm you; they just simply exist. 

The thing I love about ARAM is the fact there is a chance you will get a champion you know very well or the chance you'll get a champion you never played before. If it a new champion, you can get the feel for their skills and possibly learn to play said champion on Rift. Also, it means because you're team is chosen at random, that means you can get out of the meta because you can have a team filled with all Attack Damage Carry(ADC) or a team of all tanks or a team of all supports.

Another reason I like ARAM is the fact that the people who usually play are relaxed. I say this usually because the champions are selected at random. Most people don't yell at you for being bad a champion because it was not your decision to play that specific champion. Very few people will get mad at you if you try to at least to make some assists.

Overall, ARAM is a very fun format. It a break from Classic and it helps with me learning a new champion. If you havent checked it out, I high recommend it.