How To Use Geass

I bought one of the silliest things I've ever seen on ebay. ^_^



It's a Code Geass Sleep Mask!

I don't actually need one, if I ever have trouble sleeping it's not usually because there's too much light. I just thought this looks too funny!

Anyway. For some reason, it comes with instructions on a bit of card. The product was cheap, and originated in Hong Kong, so the photocopied instructions could be for anything, for all I know. Anyway. It clearly says "HowToUse GEASS"... but even if I could easily read the Japanese that's written there, it's far too blurred to make out the characters. What a pity!

If you want to try and see if you can read it, click on the picture above to see a larger version of the image!

...maybe if it enables me to use GEASS, I shouldn't use this too often...

Mystery Dungeon Shiren DS game heading for the US

I found out that the Nintendo DS "Shiren The Wanderer Mystery Dungeon" game is being translated into English to be released in North America at the beginning of March, so I placed a preorder. ^__^

Shiren is a "graphical roguelike" game which I've heard a lot about but haven't actually played. I could have, since there's an English translation patch for the 2nd Shiren game on Super Famicon released by Aeon Genesis. But, I haven't gotten round to trying it. I'm fond of roguelikes like Angband and games like "Izuna: Legend Of The Unemployed Ninja" and "Azure Dreams" (and to a lesser extent, it's sequel Tao's Adventure for DS). My first was "Sword Of Fargoal" for the Commodore 64 - I think it was one of the best games out at the time! Randomly generated dungeons and the drive to fight all the way through, challenging and unforgiving, I like it.

I bought another 2nd hand Gameboy Advance SP over the weekend, a battered old 2nd hand Charizard flame red one, scuffed everywhere on the outside and with "KYLE" scratched into the back, presumably by its previous owner. Cute. But, it has a perfect screen and that's what's important. It came with a copy of Advance Wars, but I started playing my copy of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team instead. ^_^ I bought the game a few months ago (when I got into the Izuna game) but never tried it out. It's by Chunsoft, same as the Shiren games, and I have to say it's lots of fun, I'm really enjoying it. This game blends Pokemon and roguelike gaming together pretty well. You can recruit friendly Pokemon to join you on your quests, and I haven't played any roguelike where you take a party into the dungeon before; that's new to me. I also like that you can collect friend pokemon - I don't think there's an actual pokedex so you know how far through you are, though.

It's pretty easy compared to most of the roguelikes I've played, but it is a Pokemon game after all. There's a personality test to decide which Pokemon you will be throughout the game, and I turned out to be a Charmander. ^_^ I tend to be fire type in personality tests...

I haven't played any Shiren games before, but I've played "Izuna Legend Of The Unemployed Ninja" for DS, and I was amazed how much the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon game looks and plays like Izuna. The Izuna game looks graphically very similar (including the size of sprites how much you see of the map), plays almost the same way (just the weapon / armour / scroll powering up system is different), and even assigns the same buttons to commands - right trigger to easily maneuver diagonals, left trigger for easy access use your projectile/trap weapons, B button to dash in a direction until you bump into something interesting.... So I guess it's a complete rip-off of Shiren. But, at least that means it's a rip-off that's complete. ^_^

I also only found out today that a game I bought on Play Asia years ago super-cheap (like, a fiver or something) - Dragon Quest: Shonen Yangus to Fushigi no Dungeon - is another roguelike. I never even took it out of the box yet, though, hehe. You see, I heard that the Dragon Quest game it spins off from wasn't too great, so I didn't start that, so I never looked into the spinoff game...

I'm really looking forward to Shiren DS. Shiren is famously good and infamously difficult and unforgiving. There's a 50 second trailer for it here. It starts off "From the makers of Pokemon {R) Mystery Dungeon"... ^_^;;

Kengo 3 for PS2 is coming to the UK

It's listed in the preorders on GAME here for only £14.99, listed as "Ninja vs Samurai" - which is its sub-title. I placed an order today.

I quite like the Kengo games. They may not be so great in the way people normally rate games, but they have a very "authentic" feel to them that I like. There's the singular focussed goal of becoming the best swordsman, there's the emphasis on learning your moves and strategising with them, and the patience and skill needed to win and move forward.

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni - doujin game translation

Over the last few weeks I've really been getting into the anime version of "Higurashi no Naku Koro ni". It's a really brilliant series, excellently executed in such a way that it's richly layered, unfolding in the most gripping and entertaining way. It's fairly gruesome in a few places, though, so not for the weak-stomached... I'm up to the 23rd episode of the first season so far...

This first season of this series started being released on DVD in the US by Geneon, but they've since stopped releasing DVDs, so that's a pity. It's only possible to legally buy half of the TV series in English.

The series was based on a multi-part doujin visual novel (or, sound novel, the box says - which means it's mostly text, not so visual) by "07th Expansion", and a group of fans are working on translating the text into English. Their work is available here: http://rapidshare.com/users/MQK6IW

So far they've done the first five days of the Onikakushi arc game (the first story in the anime series), both for the free demo version of the game and for the full version of the game. I haven't tried it yet. I've placed an order for what I thought was a copy of the Higurashi no Naku Koro ni game, but if the pics on wikipedia are anything to go by, that may just be the Himatsubushi arc game (which is the "time wasting" arc, the last of the "question" arcs in the game and the middle of the TV series). Which, on its own, would be a waste of time. But then, the fan-translators point towards instructions on buying Higurashi online to download and play, and it has the same boxart. So, I'm a bit confused. It mentions on wikipedia that each of the answer arcs contains the previous game, so maybe the final question arc did too? Oh well, I'll see how it goes. I also ordered a CD at the same time so I expect I'll be happy with whatever turns up. I want to finish watching the anime series first, and go onto viewing the second season (Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kai).

BTW there's a live-action movie coming this year as well. The very idea makes me somewhat afraid.

EDIT - 2008-02-11 20:30: My copy of the Higurashi game arrived today, hooray! It says on the fan translation site that their patch is made for the Himatsubushi-hen version of the game (maybe I didn't notice before), so it'll be the right one. I need to clear up some space to install it. I've listened to the CD - the Yukino Satsuki version of "you" - I really love it. I like this tune, it's so addictive. ^__^

Persona 3 - UK release - free artbook

I also placed a preorder for Persona 3 for PS2. It comes out in the UK at the end of this month. I've preordered with GAME because it's the same price as everywhere else, but comes with a free artbook. Hooray!

The Mysterious Cites Of Gold - DVD Box Set

Yay! It's all finally coming out on DVD! And yay I persuaded my boyfriend to preorder it for me as a birthday present!

It's available from HMV UK as a worldwide exclusive! It costs £37.99! Here's the link:

Mysterious Cites Of Gold DVD Box Set

The HMV preorder page has a little video clip of the opening sequence. I used to really like this series when I was little. It's really good. At least, that's what my nostalgic memory tells me. ^_^

Arcana Heart for PS2 - in English

Arcana Heart is, as far as I've heard, a really rather good 2D fighting game for PS2. On the professional level, it's pretty well balanced and is played at tournament level. For the rest of us, it's all-girl fighting and looks both cute and funny.

The Arcana Heart Official Website is open and contains wallpapers and stuff, so have a look. ^_^