Last night was a bit weird.
During the day I was feeling quite good, but then when I got home I dunno - it was like my blood sugar crashed or something, but that wouldn't make sense as I had quite a large dinner (too large, really as I made a bit of an error).
It was weird. All I really ended up doing was reading a few comics :/.
Plans for the weekend are pretty low key.
Hopefully what I'll do is actually continue with the start I made at scanning my magazine backlog. Also I'd like to watch some proper anime on DVD, but recently there's been a bit of an increase in the number of shows that I've been watching on telly and I'd rather keep them in line.
Someone in the office has had swine flu!
My malaise is unrelated, as they have been working off site, although he's in today so I'm sure I'll be imagining symptoms throughout the weekend!
It's slightly weird when you actually know someone who's had this thing that the media has been banging on about for so long.
By the sound of things he's not been having much fun, though - quite a nasty little disease by the sounds of things!
Friday 18 September 2009
Thursday 17 September 2009
almost unbelievable
I did some scanning!
Granted, not a lot of scanning, but "some" is, like, a million percent more than "none" isn't it?
I've also been continuing to watch anime fansubs. Some of this was while I scanned, but the majority was just randomly watched.
Guin Saga
Well I guess this show proves I haven't lost my disinterest in fantasy like I was afraid with Tear to Tiara. Guin Saga did very little for me.
It's a fantasy type story, in case you hadn't guessed, and, as far as I'm aware, it's another one based on an RPG and it again shows. But where Tiara had a bit of humour to lift it, this is played totally straight.
It's odd the parallels between the shows, actually - both involve royal siblings being saved/aided by people we're not quite sure about. In Tiara it was unclear if he was a good guy or bad guy, but in Guin it's more that it's unclear who and what he is.
Guin appears to have a leopard's head and has lost his memory. Unfortunately, the former makes him seem like some reject from a Mexican wresting match and the latter is a rather played out idea that isn't' given any real life here.
What I think I'm saying is that if fantasy is your bag then you might get more mileage, but it really wasn't for me. Oh, and whichever camp you're in, you need warning that the animation is pretty damn poor. It just about reached okay level during the fights, but otherwise it's really cheap stuff.
Shin Mazinger Shougeki! Z-Hen
Now there's a title and a half to get your gob around!
I've honestly not got a lot to say about this.
I mean, it's a Go Nagai series, and if you like Go Nagai's giant mecha stuff I see absolutely no reason you wouldn't like this.
My own personal take is somewhat of a cool distance. I have no problems with Giant Mecha (indeed, many of the shows I'd put up the top in my personal rankings would be Giant Mecha shows) but I'm not such a big fan of these "original" style shows.
It's difficult to explain - I like shows like Godannar or Gurren Lagann that pay affectionate homage to these types of shows, and I like shows like Eva that bugger about with them, but the shows themselves don't quite work for me. I think it's because there too earnest.
A knowing wink and a some sort of acknowledgement within the show itself that the whole thing is bizarre/silly goes a long way for me. I've no problem with the things they get up to, so long as there's a flavour of the creators themselves knowing that what they're doing is daft.
Plus, often-times the writing leaves a lot to be desired. And if I'm brutally honest, Go Nagai's character and mecha designs leave me a bit cold.
But if you're good with all that stuff, then this should be right up your alley.
Slap Up Party - Arad Senki
And here's another one with a bizarre name.
Also, rather bizarrely, it's yet another one where it opens in the dark. All of the series I've sampled just recently have either had all of their opening episodes set in the dark, or they've certainly opened in the dark.
Tears to Tiara the first two eps were at night, Guin Saga, the first ep was at night, Darker than Black had loads of night-time stuff, Mazinger, about 80% of what I watched was at night. And this opens in the dark too... weird. Although, to be fair, it does then proceed to being in bright daytime.
Plus, to cap things off, I believe it's another show adapted from a fantasy RPG game. I could be utterly wrong on that, as I've done no research at all, but it certainly feels like it is.
And it also feels like a show that just isn't my cup of tea.
I've never really thought much about it, but I think it's the fact that they're all really similar these fantasy RPG things. They involve a group going on a quest, often with the group acquiring allies and enemies as it goes.
They're all just Lord of the Rings with a variety of different characters.
So I guess if that sort of thing works for you, you might like it, but for me, this was a non-starter.
Princess Lover
Now this shows was a turn-up for the books.
Obviously I've seen the pictures that have been in the magazines and they rather stuck in my mind, shall we say? I mean, how could they not, given the melons quotient?
What I wasn't expecting was that the show was really rather good.
Well, the other thing I wasn't expecting was that all the fan-service would be heavily censored. And I mean all the fan-service. In the first couple of episodes the fan-service doesn't run to much more than a few panty shots and they're totally obscured by heavy black shadows.
It's a little odd - especially as in the second ep the hero actually refers to the colour of three of the girls knickers and we can't actually see them, because they're in black shadow.
Now I'm sort of used to this, in that I've seen quite a few fansubs that obviously had stuff censored out in this fashion and then later seen the DVD versions with stuff on show. But it's usually more reasonable - censoring out nipples on the broadcast TV version is understandable, knickers isn't, given how much anime has them in.
Maybe it's something to do with the time of day the show is broadcast? Or perhaps it gets more extreme later on? Certainly the show is apparently adapted from a hentai game.
But anyway, the point is that the stories actually not half bad. Or at least, it's being done in a not half bad way - I'm not sure there's anything here that I haven't seen before, but it looks like some care and attention has been put into making the plot a bit more substantial than the usual rom-com fair.
Gokujou!! Mecha Mote Iinchou
I only watched the one episode of this as it was obvious it was a show very much aimed at young girls. Plus I've only seen 2 eps subbed on the listing site I use.
I guess if you're a young girl this might work for you, but for me it was way too much into that whole genre. It's sort of wrong for me to say it was bad, as it's just not even something that's even vaguely aimed at me.
Although, and not wanting to get too deep here, I must admit, I do wonder whether this sort of thing would be produced outside of Japan. The focus the girls have on being 'pretty' seems a little disturbing to me.
I mean, on one level it rejects it, but at the same time sort of re-affirms it. It's a little odd.
Also, the animation was weird - it looked like some sort of bastard love-child of CG cell-shading and traditional hand-drawn animation. It was very odd looking.
Granted, not a lot of scanning, but "some" is, like, a million percent more than "none" isn't it?
I've also been continuing to watch anime fansubs. Some of this was while I scanned, but the majority was just randomly watched.
Guin Saga
Well I guess this show proves I haven't lost my disinterest in fantasy like I was afraid with Tear to Tiara. Guin Saga did very little for me.
It's a fantasy type story, in case you hadn't guessed, and, as far as I'm aware, it's another one based on an RPG and it again shows. But where Tiara had a bit of humour to lift it, this is played totally straight.
It's odd the parallels between the shows, actually - both involve royal siblings being saved/aided by people we're not quite sure about. In Tiara it was unclear if he was a good guy or bad guy, but in Guin it's more that it's unclear who and what he is.
Guin appears to have a leopard's head and has lost his memory. Unfortunately, the former makes him seem like some reject from a Mexican wresting match and the latter is a rather played out idea that isn't' given any real life here.
What I think I'm saying is that if fantasy is your bag then you might get more mileage, but it really wasn't for me. Oh, and whichever camp you're in, you need warning that the animation is pretty damn poor. It just about reached okay level during the fights, but otherwise it's really cheap stuff.
Shin Mazinger Shougeki! Z-Hen
Now there's a title and a half to get your gob around!
I've honestly not got a lot to say about this.
I mean, it's a Go Nagai series, and if you like Go Nagai's giant mecha stuff I see absolutely no reason you wouldn't like this.
My own personal take is somewhat of a cool distance. I have no problems with Giant Mecha (indeed, many of the shows I'd put up the top in my personal rankings would be Giant Mecha shows) but I'm not such a big fan of these "original" style shows.
It's difficult to explain - I like shows like Godannar or Gurren Lagann that pay affectionate homage to these types of shows, and I like shows like Eva that bugger about with them, but the shows themselves don't quite work for me. I think it's because there too earnest.
A knowing wink and a some sort of acknowledgement within the show itself that the whole thing is bizarre/silly goes a long way for me. I've no problem with the things they get up to, so long as there's a flavour of the creators themselves knowing that what they're doing is daft.
Plus, often-times the writing leaves a lot to be desired. And if I'm brutally honest, Go Nagai's character and mecha designs leave me a bit cold.
But if you're good with all that stuff, then this should be right up your alley.
Slap Up Party - Arad Senki
And here's another one with a bizarre name.
Also, rather bizarrely, it's yet another one where it opens in the dark. All of the series I've sampled just recently have either had all of their opening episodes set in the dark, or they've certainly opened in the dark.
Tears to Tiara the first two eps were at night, Guin Saga, the first ep was at night, Darker than Black had loads of night-time stuff, Mazinger, about 80% of what I watched was at night. And this opens in the dark too... weird. Although, to be fair, it does then proceed to being in bright daytime.
Plus, to cap things off, I believe it's another show adapted from a fantasy RPG game. I could be utterly wrong on that, as I've done no research at all, but it certainly feels like it is.
And it also feels like a show that just isn't my cup of tea.
I've never really thought much about it, but I think it's the fact that they're all really similar these fantasy RPG things. They involve a group going on a quest, often with the group acquiring allies and enemies as it goes.
They're all just Lord of the Rings with a variety of different characters.
So I guess if that sort of thing works for you, you might like it, but for me, this was a non-starter.
Princess Lover
Now this shows was a turn-up for the books.
Obviously I've seen the pictures that have been in the magazines and they rather stuck in my mind, shall we say? I mean, how could they not, given the melons quotient?
What I wasn't expecting was that the show was really rather good.
Well, the other thing I wasn't expecting was that all the fan-service would be heavily censored. And I mean all the fan-service. In the first couple of episodes the fan-service doesn't run to much more than a few panty shots and they're totally obscured by heavy black shadows.
It's a little odd - especially as in the second ep the hero actually refers to the colour of three of the girls knickers and we can't actually see them, because they're in black shadow.
Now I'm sort of used to this, in that I've seen quite a few fansubs that obviously had stuff censored out in this fashion and then later seen the DVD versions with stuff on show. But it's usually more reasonable - censoring out nipples on the broadcast TV version is understandable, knickers isn't, given how much anime has them in.
Maybe it's something to do with the time of day the show is broadcast? Or perhaps it gets more extreme later on? Certainly the show is apparently adapted from a hentai game.
But anyway, the point is that the stories actually not half bad. Or at least, it's being done in a not half bad way - I'm not sure there's anything here that I haven't seen before, but it looks like some care and attention has been put into making the plot a bit more substantial than the usual rom-com fair.
Gokujou!! Mecha Mote Iinchou
I only watched the one episode of this as it was obvious it was a show very much aimed at young girls. Plus I've only seen 2 eps subbed on the listing site I use.
I guess if you're a young girl this might work for you, but for me it was way too much into that whole genre. It's sort of wrong for me to say it was bad, as it's just not even something that's even vaguely aimed at me.
Although, and not wanting to get too deep here, I must admit, I do wonder whether this sort of thing would be produced outside of Japan. The focus the girls have on being 'pretty' seems a little disturbing to me.
I mean, on one level it rejects it, but at the same time sort of re-affirms it. It's a little odd.
Also, the animation was weird - it looked like some sort of bastard love-child of CG cell-shading and traditional hand-drawn animation. It was very odd looking.
Wednesday 16 September 2009
shrek the third
If ever there was a series that accurately portrayed the law of diminishing returns it's Shrek.
The first one was brilliant - very funny, telling a heart-warming story and reaching a conclusion that managed to both have its cake and eat it.
The second one was okay. It had some funny high-points, a reasonable story that admittedly felt a bit like a re-tread of the first, but an okay conclusion. It was also a little hampered by a slightly too big scope and cast.
The third was distinctly average.
The jokes were rather thin on the ground, for starters. Not least of all because the central joke of having fantastical characters be real feels a little worn down now. I mean it's a good idea and all, but I do find myself picking holes in it.
I mean, why is the Arthur character depicted as an unpopular wimp? It doesn't really make a lot of sense, especially given he's quite handsome and reveals himself to be quite intelligent. Why would he be unpopular? It's never quite addressed.
Well, he's unpopular because it's high-school and it suits the theme of the Shrek films for self-discovery to be his arc.
And mentioning the high-school, man did it loose me during this section. First off - I'm not American, I never went to high-school, it's a frame of reference that means very little to me.
Plus the types of characters they had seemed like very old jokes. The nerds playing D&D, the popular girls speaking in valley girl speak. I mean it was hard to even tell they were jokes, to be honest.
And then you've got the idea about Prince Charming banding all the 'bad' fairytale characters together and taking over Never-never land. Okay, fair enough, but it was really badly executed.
I mean, they just seemed to sort of turn up, fly about on their brooms (where they heck they got them all from, I don't know) and then land and... they'd won. I don't recall seeing a single guard or military type, despite both of the previous films showing (and, to some extent, relying on) their respective cities having significant numbers of guards.
I dunno, it just didn't seem to make a whole lot of sense.
Also, the characters didn't really seem to grow or develop a great deal. I mean, Shrek kinda became a father, but then the idea that he was not keen on being a Dad got a bit lost somewhere along the line. I think part of the problem is because they were aware they were essentially retreading the same plot beats.
But also it's one thing for him to be screwing up his relationship with his girlfriend in 2, it's quite another for that same plot-thread to be properly played out with regards to un-born children. What could they do? Have him suggest abortion? Or doing a runner? In a family/kids film?
So yeah, I wouldn't recommend it.
I did actually watch another film this last weekend - Tropic Thunder. I'd probably recommend that one more, but it also wasn't the best. I won't talk about it here much, as I'll do a full review for trismugistus.com I think.
The first one was brilliant - very funny, telling a heart-warming story and reaching a conclusion that managed to both have its cake and eat it.
The second one was okay. It had some funny high-points, a reasonable story that admittedly felt a bit like a re-tread of the first, but an okay conclusion. It was also a little hampered by a slightly too big scope and cast.
The third was distinctly average.
The jokes were rather thin on the ground, for starters. Not least of all because the central joke of having fantastical characters be real feels a little worn down now. I mean it's a good idea and all, but I do find myself picking holes in it.
I mean, why is the Arthur character depicted as an unpopular wimp? It doesn't really make a lot of sense, especially given he's quite handsome and reveals himself to be quite intelligent. Why would he be unpopular? It's never quite addressed.
Well, he's unpopular because it's high-school and it suits the theme of the Shrek films for self-discovery to be his arc.
And mentioning the high-school, man did it loose me during this section. First off - I'm not American, I never went to high-school, it's a frame of reference that means very little to me.
Plus the types of characters they had seemed like very old jokes. The nerds playing D&D, the popular girls speaking in valley girl speak. I mean it was hard to even tell they were jokes, to be honest.
And then you've got the idea about Prince Charming banding all the 'bad' fairytale characters together and taking over Never-never land. Okay, fair enough, but it was really badly executed.
I mean, they just seemed to sort of turn up, fly about on their brooms (where they heck they got them all from, I don't know) and then land and... they'd won. I don't recall seeing a single guard or military type, despite both of the previous films showing (and, to some extent, relying on) their respective cities having significant numbers of guards.
I dunno, it just didn't seem to make a whole lot of sense.
Also, the characters didn't really seem to grow or develop a great deal. I mean, Shrek kinda became a father, but then the idea that he was not keen on being a Dad got a bit lost somewhere along the line. I think part of the problem is because they were aware they were essentially retreading the same plot beats.
But also it's one thing for him to be screwing up his relationship with his girlfriend in 2, it's quite another for that same plot-thread to be properly played out with regards to un-born children. What could they do? Have him suggest abortion? Or doing a runner? In a family/kids film?
So yeah, I wouldn't recommend it.
I did actually watch another film this last weekend - Tropic Thunder. I'd probably recommend that one more, but it also wasn't the best. I won't talk about it here much, as I'll do a full review for trismugistus.com I think.
Tuesday 15 September 2009
eBay doesn't want me
I knew there was something I forgot yesterday! I had another figurine come from Japan, and as per usual it got hit with customs. I paid the customs and set the delivery date and it never showed up. So, in other words that made it a triumvirate of non-delivery things, hence the post.
Both animage and the figurine turned up yesterday, so I guess that's a tick in a couple of boxes at least. So now back to the scheduled post:
eBay has recently introduced a new policy that, by the looks of things, manages to top all of their previous idiocy by quite some considerable margin.
Last time I ranted on I hit the epoch of all swearing, describing them as a bunch of cunts. While this adequately and succinctly summed up my feeling at the time, it unfortunately leaves me with the situation that I have no higher level of swearitude to go to in order to express my displeasure.
I think what I'm going to do is use cunts^2 (or cunts squared - cunts multiplied by cunts) as I think it sums up the drastic increase in their cuntitude.
So what have they done?
Well, they've introduced a system used "DSR" which stands for "Detailed Seller Ratings" and are basically ratings out of 5 given by users on 4 elements:
And the idea is that if you get an average DSR in any of these below a particular threshold (4.3!) across either 12 months or 3 months, then you get 'punished'. Alternatively, they seem to have set some hard limits too, so that if you get 4 "low" DSRs (1s or 2s) you also get punished.
The punishments are that your item gets lowered in the search returns (don't really know how this works if your item is the only one or one of five in a search. Also, you can get suspended from e-bay - that is, they won't let you sell anything until your DSRs normalise.
If you've more than about 4 brain cells I reckon you can already pick about a million holes in this whole system, but let's focus on some particularly juicy points:
The scorecard is weighted. That is, you may think, like a normal, sensible and rational human being, that, on a scale of 5, 'average' is 3, 'good' is 4 and 'excellent' is 5. Well look at the number you're required to get - 4.3. That means that if all your customers rate your service as 'good' you get punished.
How in the name of fuck is that a sensible way to set your system up?
Unless you're a cunt^2, of course.
Then there's the punishments - my ratings get lowered or I get banned from e-bay because one or two douche bags give me low ratings?
Yeah, that's fair. Especially when I have absolutely no way to retaliate. For example, did you know it's actually now impossible for a seller to rate a buyer negatively?
What else?
Well, according to some postings around the web and on the support forums, your buyers don't actually even have to rate you low to fuck you over - if they don't leave any DSRs (so they just give you the normal rating) then that counts as a "0"!
So their laziness rapes me in the arse.
Also, reading around, everyone is getting low DSRs on postage and packaging. I've ranted on this before that people don't seem to have any idea of how much postage costs - they don't even go and look at the god-damn Royal Mail website and check, they just seem to think you're ripping them off automatically.
Well guess what - even people who have buckled to the previous shit-sandwich e-Bay served us sellers and started doing free postage are getting low DSRs for postage. I mean seriously, if you offer free postage, some people still won't give you a 5! Not that you need to be a genius to work that out, just a cunt^2 not to take it into account.
There's tonnes of other stuff and I could go on for ages, but the last thing I'd mention is what seems to be behind this.
There's a distinct air that what's motivating it is that e-bay wants to get rid of small-time sellers like me. By the sound of things they basically want to become a wholesalers outfit.
So they want to abandon their whole business model and shed the core customer base.
Bunch of cunts^2.
Both animage and the figurine turned up yesterday, so I guess that's a tick in a couple of boxes at least. So now back to the scheduled post:
eBay has recently introduced a new policy that, by the looks of things, manages to top all of their previous idiocy by quite some considerable margin.
Last time I ranted on I hit the epoch of all swearing, describing them as a bunch of cunts. While this adequately and succinctly summed up my feeling at the time, it unfortunately leaves me with the situation that I have no higher level of swearitude to go to in order to express my displeasure.
I think what I'm going to do is use cunts^2 (or cunts squared - cunts multiplied by cunts) as I think it sums up the drastic increase in their cuntitude.
So what have they done?
Well, they've introduced a system used "DSR" which stands for "Detailed Seller Ratings" and are basically ratings out of 5 given by users on 4 elements:
- Item as Described
- Communication
- Dispatch Time
- Postage and Packaging Charges
And the idea is that if you get an average DSR in any of these below a particular threshold (4.3!) across either 12 months or 3 months, then you get 'punished'. Alternatively, they seem to have set some hard limits too, so that if you get 4 "low" DSRs (1s or 2s) you also get punished.
The punishments are that your item gets lowered in the search returns (don't really know how this works if your item is the only one or one of five in a search. Also, you can get suspended from e-bay - that is, they won't let you sell anything until your DSRs normalise.
If you've more than about 4 brain cells I reckon you can already pick about a million holes in this whole system, but let's focus on some particularly juicy points:
The scorecard is weighted. That is, you may think, like a normal, sensible and rational human being, that, on a scale of 5, 'average' is 3, 'good' is 4 and 'excellent' is 5. Well look at the number you're required to get - 4.3. That means that if all your customers rate your service as 'good' you get punished.
How in the name of fuck is that a sensible way to set your system up?
Unless you're a cunt^2, of course.
Then there's the punishments - my ratings get lowered or I get banned from e-bay because one or two douche bags give me low ratings?
Yeah, that's fair. Especially when I have absolutely no way to retaliate. For example, did you know it's actually now impossible for a seller to rate a buyer negatively?
What else?
Well, according to some postings around the web and on the support forums, your buyers don't actually even have to rate you low to fuck you over - if they don't leave any DSRs (so they just give you the normal rating) then that counts as a "0"!
So their laziness rapes me in the arse.
Also, reading around, everyone is getting low DSRs on postage and packaging. I've ranted on this before that people don't seem to have any idea of how much postage costs - they don't even go and look at the god-damn Royal Mail website and check, they just seem to think you're ripping them off automatically.
Well guess what - even people who have buckled to the previous shit-sandwich e-Bay served us sellers and started doing free postage are getting low DSRs for postage. I mean seriously, if you offer free postage, some people still won't give you a 5! Not that you need to be a genius to work that out, just a cunt^2 not to take it into account.
There's tonnes of other stuff and I could go on for ages, but the last thing I'd mention is what seems to be behind this.
There's a distinct air that what's motivating it is that e-bay wants to get rid of small-time sellers like me. By the sound of things they basically want to become a wholesalers outfit.
So they want to abandon their whole business model and shed the core customer base.
Bunch of cunts^2.
Monday 14 September 2009
missing
So on Friday I mentioned I'd gotten e-mails telling me newtype, animedia and animage had been sent.
Well, when I got home I was a bit surprised to find that only two of them were there - newtype and animedia. Animage was nowhere to be found :/.
Quite why this was I don't know - TNT are the couriers and one of the guys I happened to talk to specifically mentioned delivering 3 at once, so it's not like they're unaware of it.
I hope it turns up of its own accord. With it being sent from Japan and them not providing tracking numbers I don't really fancy trying to find out what's happened to it. Not least of all because they always have those "it could take 12 weeks to arrive" disclaimers on. If I try to contact them, I'm sure I'll get some sort of response like that.
I had a similar experience with the Royal Mail. A DVD I sent that someone bought off me on e-bay has not been delivered, so I've sent a claim form. However I couldn't send it straight away because they don't consider things lost "until 15 days after it was sent".
It didn't help matters that they wanted loads of evidence. It was a total pain in the arse.
And guess what the things worth? 10p. Yup, that's right, it was one of those DVDs that went for way below a sensible price (if you take off the final valuation fee and PayPal charges I'll have lost money) and now it looks like it'll be costing me even more money.
There didn't seem to be a way to reclaim the packaging cost for starters, and I wouldn't be surprised if the claim is rejected, so I'll end up refunding without the compensation :(.
Postally, I'm not having much luck lately.
Well, when I got home I was a bit surprised to find that only two of them were there - newtype and animedia. Animage was nowhere to be found :/.
Quite why this was I don't know - TNT are the couriers and one of the guys I happened to talk to specifically mentioned delivering 3 at once, so it's not like they're unaware of it.
I hope it turns up of its own accord. With it being sent from Japan and them not providing tracking numbers I don't really fancy trying to find out what's happened to it. Not least of all because they always have those "it could take 12 weeks to arrive" disclaimers on. If I try to contact them, I'm sure I'll get some sort of response like that.
I had a similar experience with the Royal Mail. A DVD I sent that someone bought off me on e-bay has not been delivered, so I've sent a claim form. However I couldn't send it straight away because they don't consider things lost "until 15 days after it was sent".
It didn't help matters that they wanted loads of evidence. It was a total pain in the arse.
And guess what the things worth? 10p. Yup, that's right, it was one of those DVDs that went for way below a sensible price (if you take off the final valuation fee and PayPal charges I'll have lost money) and now it looks like it'll be costing me even more money.
There didn't seem to be a way to reclaim the packaging cost for starters, and I wouldn't be surprised if the claim is rejected, so I'll end up refunding without the compensation :(.
Postally, I'm not having much luck lately.
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