I’ll have whatever he’s having.
Wash It All Away Ep. 8
Wakana gets a stalker in this week’s episode. Actually, the girl just wants to know how to be less shy, so she thinks watching our heroine interact with her customers is enough to do the trick. Wakana has a slightly more radical solution: get naked. Yeah, I don’t think that’s what they mean by exposure therapy. But of course, the person who wrote this story will find any reason to undress his heroine. Case in point, in the latter half of the episode, Wakana gets roped into being a model for an article to help drum up tourism. As a result, she gets (almost) naked again. Hm, what was this show about again?
There was a Cute Girl in the Hero’s Party, so I Tried Confessing to Her Ep. 8
Yoki, Happiness, and Raven investigate a case where cargo has been going missing at a port city. The sailors pin the blame on a mermaid, which Raven readily believes. After all, why trust a demon? First, I don’t think of mermaids as demons. Second, if you’re going to lump them in with demonkind, shouldn’t you also say the same about Happiness, his crush? She’s a harpy, but what makes that different from a half-woman, half-fish thing…? Ah, I don’t get it. Wait, he knows Happiness isn’t human, right? Anyway, the sailors are the true culprit. They have been forcing the mermaid to work for them, because they have her friend (also a mermaid) in their captivity.
Somehow, this case gets Happiness and Raven to become an official couple. I dunno, man. Dude was kinda prejudiced against an innocent demon. Yeah, he learns his lesson now, but I don’t trust “reformed” racists right off the bat.
Tune In to the Midnight Heart Ep. 8
The twintailed tsundere wants to be a voice actress, but there’s just one teeny, tiny problem: she can’t act. At the moment, she’s trying to portray a jilted lover, but she can’t muster up a credible performance. So of course, Yamabuki has to save the day once again. The rest of the club cooks up a scenario where Yamabuki has been cheating on her with the vtuber. But this still doesn’t work for Himekawa, because it feels fake to her. Girl…. THAT’S WHY IT’S CALLED ACTING. Oh, don’t tell me you think Kathy Bates was drawing from her own personal experiences of torturing people when she played Annie Wilkes in Misery?! Don’t tell me you think that’s how acting works?! The answer is yes, actually. The rest of the club then tricks Himekawa into thinking that Yamabuki has been dating Kirino in secret. They literally cuck her into being a good actress. Amazing storytelling! Bravissimo!
The Case Book of Arne Ep. 8
In my opinion, the supernatural angle ruins these mysteries. When you first find out that the missing men had been turned into statues, you start thinking, Ooh, how did some sick twisted individual turn them into statues? Well, it turns out that the culprit is a literal ass Medusa. Lynn even beats her by pulling an uno reverso on the Gorgon: she tricks Medusa into looking a mirror, thereby forcing the monster to turn herself into stone. This presumably turns everyone else back to life (the dead stay dead because they’re beheaded), because Medusa is ultimately defeated. But then wouldn’t her own stone body turn back to normal because she is also–… ah, whatever. Look, I don’t think Medusa is supposed to be able to turn herself into stone, because she would’ve inadvertently doomed herself a long time ago. There are reflections everywhere in life. It’s raining and there’s a puddle outside? Whoops, you’re stoned! Look into a storefront but you see your own reflection in the glass instead? Whoops, you’re stoned! Plus, in the original myth, she was defeated because Perseus could safely see her reflection off of his mirror shield. Ah well, I don’t expect an anime to be accurate to the original Greek myths. The original point is, an actual monster instead of a human monster is just less intriguing to me.
Also, Amy having a rocket-powered arm was so fucking random.
Jack-of-All-Trades, Party of None Ep. 8
This doesn’t seem like a conversation that kids would be having. But what do we learn this week? That Orhun is really, really awesome, you guys. He’s just been holding back because he couldn’t bear the burden of expectations!!! But he’s really, truly the chosen one. He just doesn’t realize it. Meh, typical power fantasy slop. I bet the show’s intended audience is full of people who think they could’ve made something of themselves if they had only tried in life! All this untapped potential just sitting in front of the computer, watching anime every night!
But hey, we get a new face. Her name is Sion, and she’s yet another childhood friend. Jesus, how many childhood friends does this guy have? What about Luna? Are we done with her already? Out with the old childhood friend, in with the new hotness? Anyway, Sion’s job is to meet with the “famed dragonslayer,” then determine whether or not this person has sided with the Church with a capital C. I don’t even know what that means. Church? What Church? All of a sudden, we have major factions contending for power? Damn, we really sat through seven episodes of prologue before the actually story finally decided to kick in. Unfortunately, Sion doesn’t know that the “famed dragonslayer” is none other than her childhood friend Orhun. In fact, she manipulated as a child into thinking that he was killed by the Church. Dun dun dun.
Speaking of Orhun, despite this universe seemingly revolving around him, nothing all that interesting actually happens with him this week. It’s all logistics, i.e. becoming a lieutenant in his new guild, meeting the party he’ll be rocking with, and also getting himself a new sword. Apparently, he’s been using bargain bin, Walmart-ass swords this entire time. His new party members actually have to convince him to get himself an artisanal, hipster sword from a true craftsman. Sure.
Easygoing Territory Defense by the Optimistic Lord Ep. 7
It’s funny how you can easily tell the good guys from the bad guys. Anyway, a bunch of unscrupulous merchants try to short-change Van, so the kid goes around them by having his own merchants start up a trading company. But in order for this to happen, he has to become a noble. All you gotta do is perform a great feat, and since Van got credit for slaying that dragon, he’s now a baron.
Afterwards, refugees from a nearby village have come to Van Town in search of a new home. Van readily takes them in, houses them, feeds them, and even gives them jobs. Whoa, are you allowed to do that? Why aren’t we throwing them into concentration camps? Why aren’t we shipping them off to prisons in countries they’re not even from? What is this “compassion” thing you speak of? I don’t think this is how we make Van Town great again!
Jokes aside, the town’s layout is kinda… unimaginative.
The Invisible Man and His Soon-to-Be Wife Ep. 7
Tonome and Yako won’t get married right away, but they will date with the intention of getting married one day! They won’t start living together yet, but they will start planning to cohabitate one day! Sheesh, making plans to make plans seems so silly to me. It reminds me of Yamada from You and I Are Polar Opposites telling his friends that he’s not in love, but he’s on the way to being in love. Still, it’s always nice to see progress in more ways than one. We also get to see Yako help Tonome get over his childhood trauma while Jirashi doles out blunt trauma. See, everyone has an important role to play!
Speaking of intimacy, we are introduced to a human-oni couple in this week’s episode. Not to be crude, but how exactly do they handle intimacy? I mean, they have a kid, so something is obviously working.
The Holy Grail of Eris Ep. 7
It always disappoints me when a mystery protagonist stumbles upon the solution through shear happenstance. Since the very second episode of the series, Constance has been trying to figure out the secret behind Lily’s key. We get two major developments in this week’s episode, and they occur practically back to back. The first 90% of the episode might as well be filler1. So what are these major developments? First, the key itself is no key. According to Randolph, it’s merely a decorative object with an important “key” engraved on it. Yes, this string of letters and numbers pinpoints the exact location you need to go on this map. And how does Constance suddenly manage to draw this connection? By randomly bumping into a seemingly lost stranger in the streets. Sure, our heroine still has to put two and two together, so bravo for that. But had Constance never met the woman with the big sword, we’d still be stuck at square one. I don’t need Constance to be as brilliant as Sherlock Holmes, but I dunno… the way this unfolded just feels unsatisfying.
1Aisha is murdered by the cult, Abigail is framed, the good guys blackmail a judge through the power of prostitutes, then Abigail is found not guilty. The end. You could’ve taken this whole section out of the episode and I’m not sure it would’ve changed much.
Roll Over and Die Ep. 7
There’s a distinct pattern in this show. Thanks to Flum’s insane regenerative powers, she always has to eat shit every episode, then she gets back up and gets her revenge. Rinse and repeat for every encounter. This week, Dein taps into his cartoonishly evil side. By threatening the life of a blind, amnesiac orphan, he convinces Flum to chug a bottle of potent poison. So of course, she does so and proceeds to writhe in pain as the evil men evilly chuckle from an evil distance. Once the intended audience is enraged, Flum leaves her enemy in complete shock by getting back up on her feet. Finally, blood and guts start flying as Flum lets her cursed sword rip and tear human flesh. It’s not quite at the level of I Spit on Your Grave, but it does feel a lil’ exploitative.
Anyway, a lieutenant in the army swoops in and saves the day this time around. Apparently, she was supposed to watch over Flum this whole time, so she’s shocked to see our heroine branded as a slave. Oh yeah, this new character is also a raging lesbian, but that’s one of the core themes of the show, so this is not really surprising. I’m just confused as to why the show felt the need to censor the word “nostrils” here.
When Sara shows up, everyone discusses the Church some more, but there’s nothing new to learn. Evil Church is evil. Evil Church experiments on orphans. That’s about it.
Also, Dein stumbles upon a monstrosity seemingly composed of his former partners in crime. If this is yet another one of the Church’s experiments, I have no clue what it’s supposed to accomplish. Yay, we can make amalgamations of human flesh!
Dark Moon: The Blood Altar Ep. 7
As I’m watching not-Chris — apparently, some evil entity has stolen Chris’s guise — kick vampire and werewolf ass left and right, I couldn’t help but wonder why Sooha is just standing there on the sideline with her mouth agape. Isn’t she supposed to be super strong? Isn’t that her entire gimmick as a character? Wah, wah, everyone thinks I’m a vampire because I have unnatural strength. Yo, your pretty boys are getting destroyed. Get in there and protect them! But no, she’d rather be a damsel in distress. Pathetic.
Heli eventually manages to get Sooha to safety. He then proceeds to explain everything to her — their backstory at the orphanage, how they only drink blood once a year on their “birthday,” how he feels like he’s found his sole purpose in life from their very first meeting, yadda, yadda, yadda. Naturally, she forgives him instantly. She even offers up her own blood, but he simply nibbles on her neck or whatever. The same girl with a complex about vampires all her life just gets over it. It’s that easy!
And just like that, we’ve brokered peace between vampires and werewolves. Yo, we should send Sooha over to the Middle East to work her magic. Maybe she could even get Putin to stand down.
HELL MODE: The Hardcore Gamer Dominates in Another World with Garbage Balancing Ep. 7
The Granvilles live on a giant estate, but Allen only gets this tiny living space. There’s even a hierarchy for the help, and Allen is naturally at very bottom. See, this is why I keep advocating for a revolution. But it’s business as usual for our child protagonist. When he gets the day off from being a manservant, the kid fucks off into a nearby forest in order to commit goblin and rabbit genocide. Sounds boring to me, but some people truly like these super grindy games. And when he’s done murdering his prey, he happily shoves his barehands into still warm goblin guts to pull out the magic stones. Sheesh.
Eventually, Allen is strong enough to save “experienced” adventurers from a pack of goblins. See, we always make fun of female body armor in RPGs, so we gotta do the same when the guys leave themselves defenseless. What, did he think having a six-pack would protect him against knives?
Reincarnated as a Dragon Hatchling Ep. 7
I have to watch the black lizard get all jealous over the dragon protagonist spending time with a bunch of monkeys. It takes the main character over half of the episode to finally realize what the problem is, but as soon as he assuages her concerns, he immediately ditches her. That’s basically all Myria does in this show, by the way. Her job is to put herself in danger, so that the dragon protagonist can rescue her over and over. You can thus expect the black lizard to get even more jealous in next week’s episode. Yawn. I do that a lot with this show. It feels like it’s going nowhere.
Scum of the Brave Ep. 7
Whoa, didn’t expect Ishino to be dead so suddenly. With him doing stuff in the background at the end of every week’s episode, I thought it would build up to something. But then he just gets offed without any fanfare. Hm. I still don’t really know what to make of this show. Or rather, I’m not getting a good read on the narrative. Take this episode, for instance. We finally find out that Jogamine’s father was also Yashiro’s former master. They have very different perceptions of the same man. Jogamine reveres her father whereas Yashiro’s recollection of the man is not so positive. But isn’t that natural? She’s her daughter. He probably nurtured her with love and care. Yashiro, on the other hand, was a former punk that the man took under his wing. He had to have nurtured Yashiro in a different way. But back in the present, our hero acts all troubled and tortured at the thought of this stark contrast. Why?
In the Clear Moonlit Dusk Ep. 7
This show reminds me why I often get so fed up with romance series. The guy wants to go to the festival, but he doesn’t send her a message confirming their plans. He thought he did, but he doesn’t bother to verify if he did or not. On the other hand, the girl wants to go to the festival, but she doesn’t send him a message either. Her friends want to help her by talking it out, but she instead tells them “this is my problem, so it’s up to me to do something about it.” What the fuck are friends for then? With that logic, you can never lean on your friends for support. Oh man, I’m really sad my cat died. Sorry, this is my problem! Can’t bug you guys about it! Ugh, my grades are low this semester. Sorry, this is my problem! Gotta study alone!
You know how this series is all about the “will they, won’t they get together” tango between the two main characters? This episode is just a microcosm of that. It’s a “will they, won’t they SEND A FUCKING TEXT.”
…
Look, there are things worth staying up all night thinking about. Major life decisions like whether to move states or countries for a relationship or job, whether to marry someone, whether to have a child, whether or not to have a child naturally or adopt, whether to get divorced, whether to buy a home, etc. Guess what, though? GOING TO THE SUMMER FESTIVAL ISN’T ONE OF THOSE MAJOR LIFE DECISIONS.
In the end, the other guy… Ouji? Yeah, him. He helps Takiguchi realize that she does like Ichimura. But even then, the show completely takes me out of the moment, because she still doesn’t send him a text to meet up. Finally, Ichimura is the one who sends a message, but she doesn’t respond. No, she just shows up at the festival in a kitsune mask to… what? Surprise him? Look at me, I’m here! Haha, the drama! So cool. Except she sees him with another girl, so she runs away when he calls out to her. So, y’know, more pointless fucking drama.
Yeah, you’re right about that, girl. You’re a pain.
On a related note, I heard someone say that You and I Are Polar Opposites has stiff competition in the romance genre. Why? ‘Cause it has both this show and Tamon’s B-Side to compete with. To say I was flabbergasted is an understatement. Tamon’s B-Side? Tamon’s B-Side?! At least In the Clear Moonlit Dusk has romance!
Kunon the Sorcerer Can See Ep. 9
We finally meet Kunon’s new classmates and professors. Sadly, our boy protagonist is a straight up pest in this week’s episode. Y’see, one of the new students is a saint with light magic. So of course, Kunon tries to turn on the “charm” simply because he just so curious about her light magic. She clearly wants nothing to do with him, though. I wish there were consequences for his bad behavior, but other than remarking about it a few times, nothing really happens. He’s gonna bother her again in next week’s episode, I’m sure.
Hana-Kimi Ep. 9
Makita takes Mizuki on a car ride, but suddenly stops on the side of the road and tries to assault her. Somehow, Sano gets there in time to save the day. How did he catch up to them? On foot? How did he know where to go? Actually, don’t question the slop. Just consume the slop.
Still scared, Mizuki blindly runs into the woods. I don’t question the fact that she got scared. I’m sure the flight part of “fight or flight” kicked in. I can’t shake the feeling, however, that the mangaka only had her run into the woods in order to set up the next trope: two lovers being lost in the wilderness so they can share a bit of intimacy. Mizuki even gets sick, so Sano has to give her water mouth to mouth! Happens all the time. Happens all the freaking time. Usually, there’s a less contrived setup. Other series will at least try something original like the female lead thinking she just grabbed a frog. But here, Mizuki is just stupid. Don’t believe me? Well, after things have calmed down a bit, Mizuki proceeds to open her mouth and dispel all doubts about her stupidity:
What a terrible person. Mizuki is a legitimately awful human being.
I don’t even wanna talk about the kiss between her and Sano. Look, she doesn’t remember if it truly happened or not. If a guy kisses someone in the forest, but the lying asshole who thinks men can’t be assaulted doesn’t feel it, did it really happen?
Oh yeah, nobody even others reporting Makita’s attempted rape. It’s not a “he said, she said” situation when Sano was also there. But nope, the lady just tells us that he disappeared in the middle of the night. These people suck.
Kaya-chan Isn’t Scary Ep. 7
The anime is still drip-feeding the main story involving Kaya’s mother and the demon-whatever fetus in her stomach. This time around, Nana, the aunt from last week’s episode, finally manages to worm her way back into her sister’s life as Kaya’s babysitter. Y’see, Kaya’s mother is hospitalized, and salaryman dad can’t take a single day off of work to raise his own kid. As a result, she just has to let an estranged family member take care of Kaya. Excellent judgment. Anyway, Nana now knows that Kaya has amazing ghost-bustin’ powers. I wonder if she’ll also realize that Kaya isn’t at fault for her mother’s sudden mental breakdown, and as a result, the cause must be something (i.e. the demon-whatever fetus). But again, the story is being drip-fed to us. So much time wasted on nonsense, like a ghost that makes kids stupidly impulsive. Or the spirit of a dead woman being assailed by ghost babies. Shrug.
Noble Reincarnation: Born Blessed, So I’ll Obtain Ultimate Power Ep. 8
A short summary of the episode can be seen in the screenshot above. A longer summary, you ask? Well…
— Noah receives yet another ring that powers him up. Don’t ask him how he knew what item to pick. It’s just his excellent judgment, okay?
— He becomes an honorary advisor to the emperor for stating the obvious: maybe we shouldn’t let rich people pay their way outta punishment. Somehow, the emperor needs a child to tell him this.
— Noah then lets his two rings do battle with each other as if they’re toy action figures. Somehow, just watching his rings fight is enough to give Noah exp. Another brilliant move from our ubermensch!
— There’s a patently hilarious sequence where Noah first kneels to the messenger, then the messenger kneels to him in return. The narration then chimes in to explain this bizarre practice, but I tuned it out. I don’t care. When something looks this dumb, no explanation can fix it.
— Our brilliant scholar-slash-advisor-slash-whatever-title-he-has-now then has some man whipped to death in public for disrespecting him. Granted, the guy’s a jackass who has been exploiting the fact that he works for the first son in order to boss people around, but is that truly deserving of death? Bah, how dare I question Noah’s judgment!
— Noah then puts himself in handcuffs in order to apologize to the first son. Why? ‘Cause if you apologize first and your brother accepts it, then the latter can’t beef about it down the line. Eat your heart out, Game of Thrones. This is true political intrigue!
So to make a long story short:
BASK IN THE GLORY OF THE SHOTA-SCHOLAR-KING!
The Villainess Is Adored by the Prince of the Neighbor(ing) Kingdom Ep. 7
I’d be pretty annoyed in Aqua(steed)’s shoes, because Tiararose has no sense of urgency whatsoever. Some guy yoinked her to his home, then forced her to go to sleep. Sounds like a crime to me. But before she goes home, she has to eat some fruit, bake some cupcakes, then put up no resistance whatsoever to the Forest King carrying her princess-style. Is she even trying to get away? Of course not. Because she wants to be in this position no matter who she kisses at the end of the day. All the hot guys are backups. Oh, heaven forbid anything happens to Aqua(steed)… but I mean if something did happen, at least Tiara isn’t short on choices!
Even though Aqua(steed) has every reason to be pissed, he has to be a “good boy” and watch as another guy — the same guy who kidnapped his fiancee — feeds Tiara by hand. Tee hee, play nice, boys~! What a fucking joke.
The episode ends with that other girl staring ominously at the ocean, so I guess we’re going to have to deal with her next. How old is she again? 14? Yeah…
Everything else about everything else:
I just finished up a playthrough of Demonschool. It’s an interesting case study on excess. The plot is pretty basic and simple. If this was simply your bread-and-butter 10-hour indie game, you’d be tempted to say that the story is charming. But it is instead stretched over 30 long hours — that’s nearly as long as the average JRPG — so it simply doesn’t work. Most of the first few chapters is just going on a wild goose chase, stumbling around the island like the Scooby Doo gang, except that most of the male characters are even bigger himbos than Fred.
Then you get to the battles. Not the battle system, which I actually kinda enjoyed. Y’see, every battle has a turn limit, and if you can accomplish your objective without exceeding the turn limit, you get the highest rank. What does the highest rank get you? Not much, I don’t think. Maybe you get more opals (this game’s currency)? But you don’t need to A-rank missions at all. It doesn’t unlock a trophy or a special ending. It’s just something to do. Nevertheless, the boss fights are actually pretty fun if you shoot for A-Ranks. Unfortunately, the game is littered with pointless battles against complete fodder. There’s a section in the game where you have to fight against a bunch of cops. It was like cutscene, battle, cutscene, battle, cutscene, battle. And each battle is the same. Yeah, the enemy layout is different, but not enough to make them feel like unique challenges. This is one of Demonschool‘s biggest problem. It doesn’t know when to stop or pull back. It feels like a project that sorely needed an editor.
The cast of characters is another huge problem. By the end of the game, you’ll end up with something insane like 15 party members. And like every RPG with a huge cast of character, they don’t feel unique. Why do we need three healers? One guy heals 1 HP and also buffs. Another guy only buffs. A girl heals 2 HP but doesn’t buff. O…kay? Like why not just make that one character with three unique abilities? The other problem is that they don’t equally contribute to the story. I’m not sure Ocean does anything but look cute. Okay, fine, when Knute needs to do something with seals, she lends a hand. And that’s pretty much it. Yeah, in a 30-hr game. It’s ridiculous. You don’t need this many characters. Instead of creating 15 shitty ones with cardboard personalities, make 5 good ones. But like I said, it feels like this project never had an editor. It feels like nobody ever took stock of the entire game, then said, “Stop, what we have is enough. We don’t need to add more. We don’t need more weeks, more battles, more characters.”
There are some positives. Like I said, I enjoyed most of the boss fights (the last boss is bizarrely easy). The backgrounds look nice. The credits describe the role of every person on the team, which is a nice touch. I would love to know more details about every dev team.
Demonschool will cost you about 25 bucks if it’s not on sale. I don’t expect 25 dollar indie games to deliver 30 hours of gameplay. But I do expect a good game regardless of the price. I can’t call Demonschool a good game.
Anyways, I just started Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma. It got pretty average reviews, but so far, I’m enjoying the gameplay loop. I was going to play Nioh 3, but I wanted something chill so I could listen to people read spooky stories.
