So I just finished up watching Durarara!!, the show about crazy adventures in Ikebukuro. I put off work to do it, but that's not really anything worth noting, as I'd have probably put it off anyways.
So, I felt like writing about it 1. because I haven't posted on here in...forever, and 2. because that was something I haven't done often enough.
Complete and Total Spoilers Below! You HAVE been warned!
So, Durarara!! is a show about Ikebukuro. Ultimately, it's not about the people in Ikebukuro, or what happens in Ikebukuro, it's about the place itself. Of course, this version of Ikebukuro is home to a headless woman who drives a bitchin' motorcycle and commands the power of shadow, as well as a crazy freak who can use a highway sign as an axe to cleave the top of a car off, plus a crazy schoolgirl who controls people she's stabbed with a cursed sword.
Did I mention crazy? Because this series is chock-full of the crazy. The only person in the cast who isn't nuts in some way is Simon, the ...wait for it...giant black Russian man who advertises and delivers for a sushi joint and kicks the ass of anyone who causes trouble, including the aforementioned crazy freak with the highway sign.
Yeah, it's a weird show.
So, plot. Here's what you find out ultimately ended up happening in the series.
A kid from the country, Mikado, moves to Ikebukuro to go to high school with his best friend, Masaomi Kida, who moved there a while back. Kida's a veteran of the town, and he introduces Mikado to a few friends and warns him about some unsavory sorts. Seems like a relatively normal start, right?
Then the Dullahan shows up. I had never heard of a Dullahan before, but what they are is apparently a Celtic spirit that rides around headless, with a headless horse, acting like a grim reaper. Celty, the one in Ikebukuro (and it's unfair to say "shows up", she's been there 20 years), has lost her head, and drives a motorcycle instead of a horse. She does awesome stunts with it.
Anyways, there's this guy, Izaya. He's a total troll. But he also knows everything about Ikebukuro.
Oh, and there are these gangs- the Dollars, some new group, and the Yellow Scarves, leftovers from the old "Color Gangs" of yesterday. And there's a sword-wielding maniac going around slashing people.
Alright, that's the setup. So here's how it all goes down.
Celty, living with this dude Shinra, is out looking for her head. As it turns out, this head is in the posession of a crazy lady who runs some pharmaceutical company. Or, alternately, attached to a girl. This girl is the friend of Anri Sonohara, a girl whom Mikado and Kida start hanging out with. Also, people are being kidnapped by this company.
The first batch of episodes are a bunch of scene-setting, introducing just what the characters were and their relationships. Then, Celty finds out about the girl, and starts chasing her. Shit happens, one particular element of which knocked my socks off:
Mikado, a while back, created The Dollars as a sort of social engineering thing, which took off in Ikebukuro. They started getting out of control, and he eventually wrangled them together into a modicum of decency, just by suggesting things. So, when things come to a head, he declares the first meeting of the Dollars and weaponizes 4Chan. Seriously. He went to confront the crazy lady (what she did is next), who had bodyguards ready to take the kid. He says "you've got brawn, I've got numbers." He sends a text message. And the entire public square they're in erupts as everyone's cellphone goes off. The entire square was made up of Dollars members. It was epic.
I can't be bothered to summarize the rest of the series, as it is so completely and utterly crazy, on the part of absolutely everyone. Suffice to say that it is wonderful, and I have never been as truly surprised watching something as I have been watching Durarara!!.
The series is wonderfully paced, has a great, diverse cast, and is so crazy in plotting that it's just a ton of fun to watch. It also makes me miss Tokyo like crazy. The show's about Ikebukuro, and even though I was on the opposite side of Tokyo, it's still about Tokyo, and...I WANNA GO BACK!
I also need to stop spoiling myself, because being surprised by Durarara!! was wonderful, and I haven't had that chance in a while now.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Friday, June 4, 2010
Nanoha! Battle of Aces!
Well, I had planned to watch quite a bit more StrikerS tonight. Despite my raging fanboyism for all things Nanoha, I haven't finished the series, possibly because I've been spoiled rotten on it. It's still really good, and I have no excuse, but I haven't.
Well, tonight, actually, I was playing Mahou Shoujou Lyrical Nanoha A's: The Battle of Aces. That's right, bitches, I've got the Nanoha fighting game. And a PSP, provided I rolled well enough on diplomacy to convince my hallmate to keep the new PSP he bought and sell me the old one.*
And it's really kickass. The combat itself is rather simple, but it's tons of fun, and really gives a great feeling of being in the middle of a Nanoha battle. It won't win any sort of award for combat complexity or anything, but I don't give a flying fuck. It's fun, that's all that I care about.
The story mode is cool. Lots of dialogue that some industrious folks over on Animesuki are translating, which, combined with my own skills, makes me feel like I'm practicing. There's a lot of cute CGs and kickass music, and the entire thing is fully voiced, which is really cool for a PSP game.
And I read somewhere that Fate's VA, Nana Mizuki, apparently wore her thumbs out on it.
*Dude's not a bad guy, but seriously. I tell him I saw a cheap PSP and it turns out to be the one he wants, so he buys it, sells me his old one for cheap, and everyone's happy, right? Well, apparently a couple of minute defects on the screen (like, seriously, it's amazing how unnoiticeable they were to me.) were too much for him, and he wanted his old one back. So I've been spending the last day fast-talking, trying to convince him that A. He's not going to get a much better deal on this PSP- if he wants better, he'll have to buy factory new, B. Returning it may cost him some money, C. I'm willing to buy his old PSP to cut back on the actual cost, and D. I already bought this game and REALLY WANT a PSP.**
** Which is funny. If you told me six months ago (well, before I heard about P3P. I don't know how long ago that was), I'd say there's no way I'd ever buy a PSP. Go figure.
Well, tonight, actually, I was playing Mahou Shoujou Lyrical Nanoha A's: The Battle of Aces. That's right, bitches, I've got the Nanoha fighting game. And a PSP, provided I rolled well enough on diplomacy to convince my hallmate to keep the new PSP he bought and sell me the old one.*
And it's really kickass. The combat itself is rather simple, but it's tons of fun, and really gives a great feeling of being in the middle of a Nanoha battle. It won't win any sort of award for combat complexity or anything, but I don't give a flying fuck. It's fun, that's all that I care about.
The story mode is cool. Lots of dialogue that some industrious folks over on Animesuki are translating, which, combined with my own skills, makes me feel like I'm practicing. There's a lot of cute CGs and kickass music, and the entire thing is fully voiced, which is really cool for a PSP game.
And I read somewhere that Fate's VA, Nana Mizuki, apparently wore her thumbs out on it.
*Dude's not a bad guy, but seriously. I tell him I saw a cheap PSP and it turns out to be the one he wants, so he buys it, sells me his old one for cheap, and everyone's happy, right? Well, apparently a couple of minute defects on the screen (like, seriously, it's amazing how unnoiticeable they were to me.) were too much for him, and he wanted his old one back. So I've been spending the last day fast-talking, trying to convince him that A. He's not going to get a much better deal on this PSP- if he wants better, he'll have to buy factory new, B. Returning it may cost him some money, C. I'm willing to buy his old PSP to cut back on the actual cost, and D. I already bought this game and REALLY WANT a PSP.**
** Which is funny. If you told me six months ago (well, before I heard about P3P. I don't know how long ago that was), I'd say there's no way I'd ever buy a PSP. Go figure.
Monday, May 24, 2010
Certain Moderation Policies
As an internet denizen, I am frequently found on forums. Sites where folks post back and forth from various and sundry places all over the world. Different sites have different policies when it comes to how moderation works. Suffice to say that I have certain issues with one particular site.
I'm not going to name names here, but anyone who is reading this who knows my posting habits can probably figure out where I'm coming from.
Across the internet, standards vary in terms of what's acceptable to post. Some sites don't give a damn about what kind of language you use as long as you're polite and aren't actively insulting people. Some sites (Something Awful) don't give a flying shit about language or insulting other people so long as you're legible and not being an idiot. And even then sometimes that's cool. Some sites aren't moderated at all.
And then there are...other sites. Sites where all discussion of politics and religion are flat-out banned, and any topic so much as trending towards there are locked.* Where absolutely no foul language is tolerated. Where, apparently, you aren't so much as allowed to criticize another poster. Where my calling out of another poster for his overly negative comments (admittedly, something of an overreaction on my part) earned me a warning.
Look, this is not the way to establish a productive discussion, single moderator who oversees the whole damn board. If you're not allowed to establish an antagonistic dialogue with someone, you cut off a fuckton of options for discussion. Fundamentally, a board is supposed to be about a bunch of people getting together to shoot the shit. When people shoot the shit, they're occasionally going to disagree. If they can't at least talk about disagreeing directly, if they've got to pussyfoot around each other like bulls in a china shop for fear of offending precious mod sensibilities, they're not going to be able to have a productive dialogue. They're just going to passive-aggressively snipe at each other and build up resentment. Fortunately, that hasn't happened with me too much- most of the folks there are surprisingly nice, but it doesn't work. It's not dialogue, it's canned, sugary bullshit.
And another thing! The policy of "infractions" building up to a ban is so goddamned retarded it makes my head spin. Functionally, it's 3 moderations means they think about banning you. Now, that in and of itself seems reasonable. It's not that reasonable when the moderations stick with you for two years each. Let's take an average- I post about 3.25 posts a day on the site in question.** Which means that if roughly one out of every 900 or so posts I make gets called out for flaming, I'm going to be looking at a ban. And you know what? What I've been modded for isn't fucking flaming. Nor were the people I was arguing with! It's disagreeing! Calling someone out! Disturbing the peace of the perfect little world that the mods have set up. It's like fucking Hot Fuzz- any and all deviation from the perfect facade is wiped out in the name of "The Greater Good". It's like they can't tolerate any sort of disagreement- everything's got to be picture-perfect and happy or else...what? People's feelings will be hurt? You won't be able to brag about having the "friendliest" community on the net? It's goddamned retarded.
And you know what it means when bans build up? Prolific posters get shafted. Not for blowing up and actively going off on a bender, but for stupid things that add up over time, things that wouldn't even be fucking noticed on other sites. And since another thing that's banned there is discussing banned posters, well, it's like they just drop off the face of the earth. I've seen several quality posters get banned, and never heard a reason, nor a justification.
And the site does not appear to be looking to change anytime soon, which means I can apparently take my problem and shove it up my ass, as I have no doubt that attacking the moderation policies like I'd like to (kind of what I've got here, but more respectful and with less profanity) would get me another warning and not accomplish anything.
Seriously, this is the worst- modded site on the internet. If I didn't have this safety valve to rant in, I'd be tempted to just go suicide by mod and send the main moderator a ridiculous hate-filled invective.
So I'll just say it here.
Go fuck yourselves.
*If you didn't know what site it is before, you probably should now.
** Which I very nearly typed out just now.
I'm not going to name names here, but anyone who is reading this who knows my posting habits can probably figure out where I'm coming from.
Across the internet, standards vary in terms of what's acceptable to post. Some sites don't give a damn about what kind of language you use as long as you're polite and aren't actively insulting people. Some sites (Something Awful) don't give a flying shit about language or insulting other people so long as you're legible and not being an idiot. And even then sometimes that's cool. Some sites aren't moderated at all.
And then there are...other sites. Sites where all discussion of politics and religion are flat-out banned, and any topic so much as trending towards there are locked.* Where absolutely no foul language is tolerated. Where, apparently, you aren't so much as allowed to criticize another poster. Where my calling out of another poster for his overly negative comments (admittedly, something of an overreaction on my part) earned me a warning.
Look, this is not the way to establish a productive discussion, single moderator who oversees the whole damn board. If you're not allowed to establish an antagonistic dialogue with someone, you cut off a fuckton of options for discussion. Fundamentally, a board is supposed to be about a bunch of people getting together to shoot the shit. When people shoot the shit, they're occasionally going to disagree. If they can't at least talk about disagreeing directly, if they've got to pussyfoot around each other like bulls in a china shop for fear of offending precious mod sensibilities, they're not going to be able to have a productive dialogue. They're just going to passive-aggressively snipe at each other and build up resentment. Fortunately, that hasn't happened with me too much- most of the folks there are surprisingly nice, but it doesn't work. It's not dialogue, it's canned, sugary bullshit.
And another thing! The policy of "infractions" building up to a ban is so goddamned retarded it makes my head spin. Functionally, it's 3 moderations means they think about banning you. Now, that in and of itself seems reasonable. It's not that reasonable when the moderations stick with you for two years each. Let's take an average- I post about 3.25 posts a day on the site in question.** Which means that if roughly one out of every 900 or so posts I make gets called out for flaming, I'm going to be looking at a ban. And you know what? What I've been modded for isn't fucking flaming. Nor were the people I was arguing with! It's disagreeing! Calling someone out! Disturbing the peace of the perfect little world that the mods have set up. It's like fucking Hot Fuzz- any and all deviation from the perfect facade is wiped out in the name of "The Greater Good". It's like they can't tolerate any sort of disagreement- everything's got to be picture-perfect and happy or else...what? People's feelings will be hurt? You won't be able to brag about having the "friendliest" community on the net? It's goddamned retarded.
And you know what it means when bans build up? Prolific posters get shafted. Not for blowing up and actively going off on a bender, but for stupid things that add up over time, things that wouldn't even be fucking noticed on other sites. And since another thing that's banned there is discussing banned posters, well, it's like they just drop off the face of the earth. I've seen several quality posters get banned, and never heard a reason, nor a justification.
And the site does not appear to be looking to change anytime soon, which means I can apparently take my problem and shove it up my ass, as I have no doubt that attacking the moderation policies like I'd like to (kind of what I've got here, but more respectful and with less profanity) would get me another warning and not accomplish anything.
Seriously, this is the worst- modded site on the internet. If I didn't have this safety valve to rant in, I'd be tempted to just go suicide by mod and send the main moderator a ridiculous hate-filled invective.
So I'll just say it here.
Go fuck yourselves.
*If you didn't know what site it is before, you probably should now.
** Which I very nearly typed out just now.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
One Piece
So, I spent the weekend (and a good chunk of last weekend) reading One Piece. It was very good, and I fully see why it's the single most popular manga ever in Japan. And I mean, it's ridiculous how much One Piece crap you see here. You go into a random store, and I'll be willing to bet that there'll be at least one One Piece item. I recall hearing that One Piece tankouban are among the best-selling books in Japan, if not the best-selling. Books, not just manga. One Piece is ridiculous. One friend of mine mentioned how some people he was working with asked him what manga he liked, then (drunkenly) insisted that he read One Piece.
At its core, One Piece is a silly, lighthearted pirate drama. It's pure shonen cheese, and it revels in it. Reactions are overblown, characters suffer ludicrous punishment* and come out smiling, and the power of friendship can beat down anything. The bad guys are ludicrously evil at times, and at other times just ludicrous. I don't feel like summarizing any of the plot right now, but suffice to say that there are moments of the purest win, and distilled awesome, and no real lows like you get in Naruto and Bleach.
Saying that...the latest arc (the Whitebeard War one) didn't do it for me. And there's a prime reason for that. The crew was broken up, and we've heard exactly jack and shit about them since Kuma split them up. It was all about Luffy trying to save his brother, and a bunch of characters I really didn't care about doing stuff. Plus, I really don't feel like One Piece's power system lends itself to epic clashes. With all the individual devil-fruit powers and whatnot, fights need to be one-on-one type deals where each combatant can have attention focuses on his abilities. Mooks are there to be effortlessly swept out of the way. Previously, One Piece pretty much stuck to that formula and it worked, but with the sheer amount of unique powers being slung around in the battle, it was highly confusing and altogether not as awesome as folk squaring off one-on-one. Sure, it's probably a touch more realistic, but...well, if you're expecting realism, you clearly haven't read One Piece.
But like I said, the fact that the Straw Hat crew was broken up (really, right after Brooks joined!) bugs me. The primary appeal of One Piece was the sheer dedication of the Nakama to one another, and that's just vanished ever since the group's been split up. Luffy's been so focused on Ace that he hasn't given a spare thought to his friends, and the manga hasn't saw fit to give them much more than a couple pages.
So I hope that we'll be seeing a reunification of the crew very shortly.
P.S.- Nico Robin is smoking hot.
*For this reason and this reason alone do I think that Luffy could take Naruto in a fight. Even given Naruto's superhuman toughness and recovery, Luffy is just in another league.
At its core, One Piece is a silly, lighthearted pirate drama. It's pure shonen cheese, and it revels in it. Reactions are overblown, characters suffer ludicrous punishment* and come out smiling, and the power of friendship can beat down anything. The bad guys are ludicrously evil at times, and at other times just ludicrous. I don't feel like summarizing any of the plot right now, but suffice to say that there are moments of the purest win, and distilled awesome, and no real lows like you get in Naruto and Bleach.
Saying that...the latest arc (the Whitebeard War one) didn't do it for me. And there's a prime reason for that. The crew was broken up, and we've heard exactly jack and shit about them since Kuma split them up. It was all about Luffy trying to save his brother, and a bunch of characters I really didn't care about doing stuff. Plus, I really don't feel like One Piece's power system lends itself to epic clashes. With all the individual devil-fruit powers and whatnot, fights need to be one-on-one type deals where each combatant can have attention focuses on his abilities. Mooks are there to be effortlessly swept out of the way. Previously, One Piece pretty much stuck to that formula and it worked, but with the sheer amount of unique powers being slung around in the battle, it was highly confusing and altogether not as awesome as folk squaring off one-on-one. Sure, it's probably a touch more realistic, but...well, if you're expecting realism, you clearly haven't read One Piece.
But like I said, the fact that the Straw Hat crew was broken up (really, right after Brooks joined!) bugs me. The primary appeal of One Piece was the sheer dedication of the Nakama to one another, and that's just vanished ever since the group's been split up. Luffy's been so focused on Ace that he hasn't given a spare thought to his friends, and the manga hasn't saw fit to give them much more than a couple pages.
So I hope that we'll be seeing a reunification of the crew very shortly.
P.S.- Nico Robin is smoking hot.
*For this reason and this reason alone do I think that Luffy could take Naruto in a fight. Even given Naruto's superhuman toughness and recovery, Luffy is just in another league.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Negima Spoilage and Speculation
So, I've not talked about Negima for a few months now. In the interim, we got Nodoka being ten kinds of kickass, Fate's plan revealed, Asuna's personality after memory restoral revealed, Negi proving one again he can solve any problem in the world by finding the right girl and kissing the bejeezus out of her, and he's apparently going full demon power or something.
But anyways, Fate's plan involves transporting everyone in the Magic World to a special "other place" that is apparently a paradise, but he doesn't really know. Because magic is what sustains life on mars, and eventually that magic's going to run out, and the whole thing will come crashing down. When it does, well, first off, every single "magic person" there vanishes straight-out. Second, every normal person (mostly in Megalomesambria) suddenly ends up on Mars proper...
So Fate's plan, since it would be wrong to just save the real folks in Megalomesambria, and impractical to have 1.2 billion new refugees on earth, is to just teleport everyone...well, somewhere. He doesn't really know much about the place, apparently. And he's got to use Asuna to do it. He apparently also needs to mass magic power in the world, which is why he destroyed the gateports- they apparently siphon it off, and now it's all poring through the old ostia gate, straight into....Mahora, obviously.
Now, I've seen this as a huge computer metaphor. The humans are all "ghosts in the machine" if you will, the magic folk are all sentient programs, and the entire magic world's a computer on the verge of a blackout. Fate wants to move folks over to a new hard drive, but he hasn't been there to see if it's kosher.
Now, with the world tree glowing, here's how I see this going down. Step one: Chao comes back! This time, there's a crisis, and Negi et. al. agrees that it's time to reveal magic to the masses. Then, using newly integrated magic and technology, they can adapt to the new refugees. That'd be chaos and hell, but it'd be interesting. I'd love to see the political implications.
But anyways, Fate's plan involves transporting everyone in the Magic World to a special "other place" that is apparently a paradise, but he doesn't really know. Because magic is what sustains life on mars, and eventually that magic's going to run out, and the whole thing will come crashing down. When it does, well, first off, every single "magic person" there vanishes straight-out. Second, every normal person (mostly in Megalomesambria) suddenly ends up on Mars proper...
So Fate's plan, since it would be wrong to just save the real folks in Megalomesambria, and impractical to have 1.2 billion new refugees on earth, is to just teleport everyone...well, somewhere. He doesn't really know much about the place, apparently. And he's got to use Asuna to do it. He apparently also needs to mass magic power in the world, which is why he destroyed the gateports- they apparently siphon it off, and now it's all poring through the old ostia gate, straight into....Mahora, obviously.
Now, I've seen this as a huge computer metaphor. The humans are all "ghosts in the machine" if you will, the magic folk are all sentient programs, and the entire magic world's a computer on the verge of a blackout. Fate wants to move folks over to a new hard drive, but he hasn't been there to see if it's kosher.
Now, with the world tree glowing, here's how I see this going down. Step one: Chao comes back! This time, there's a crisis, and Negi et. al. agrees that it's time to reveal magic to the masses. Then, using newly integrated magic and technology, they can adapt to the new refugees. That'd be chaos and hell, but it'd be interesting. I'd love to see the political implications.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Elaborating on said Idea
So, it's rainy tonight and kind of misty. Combine that with listening to the soundtracks for 3 and 4 on my way home, and you could say that I'm in a bit of a Persona mood. Incidentally, Feinne, a Let's Player, has taken up Schildtroke (or however the crap you spell his name)'s mantle and is LP'ing Persona 4 over on Something Awful. Check it out.
So! This has given me a bit of an idea for a sort of fanfic based off of the idea I posted earlier. Here's my intro for Persona 5:
-----
The train pulls into the station, and you hear the familiar jingle as the doors open- or you would, if you didn't have your headphones on, the music blasting. It's been about a week since you moved into the dormitory at the bottom of the hill. Since then you've gotten used to the route home. The ramen stand bustling with customers, and wafting out a scent that makes your mouth water. Unfortunately, you're on a budget and all you've got is the cheap instant shit at home. That one big house that would be sizeable even in America- here, it is monstrous. Another train, laden with weary commuters, roars by, the rattling shaking your teeth. It's cold, and your jacket is pulled around you as the rain drips past your face. You should have packed that heavier jacket, but you weren't supposed to need it and you needed the space in your suitcase. So you hurry through the rain, looking forward to your warm room and hot dinner.
An overpass spans the path, creating a narrow tunnel you must walk down. Bikes and scooters carrying tired commuters home pass you by, indifferent to one more hooded figure, moving too fast to even tell that you're a gaijin. Unlike the rest of this whole town, the lights here are in poor condition- they're dim and flickering. You're looking down at the pavement, music still blaring in your ears, trying to ignore the water still falling in front of you.
Out of the corner of your eye, you see a shape. It's not even remotely human- long, spindly arms reaching out to grasp at you, a slavering mouth gaping. You turn suddenly, and it's gone. All you see is the dirty graffiti on the wall, and all you hear is the thumping bass and screeching guitars that your headphones continue to pour into your ears. You shrug, and turn back to your walk home. Probably just a shadow on the wall caused by a passing biker.
The wind picks up as you exit the tunnel, blowing the rain horizontally in your face. This is miserable. As you walk down the street towards your dorm, you have to squeeze to the side of the road to prevent yourself from being run over by the drivers who take these narrow streets at ludicrous speeds. They splash your legs as they drive through the puddles.
As the music on your headphones fades out, the guiter making one last, haunting note, you swear you hear a faint voice emenating from them:
I am thou. Thou art I.
It is just on the edge of hearing, and quickly dismissed as the warm light of the dorm washes over you.
Your friend Brian- he's in your History of Tokyo class- comes up as you take your shoes off.
"How's it been? Cold as hell, isn't it?"
You mumble a response and head for your room, desperate to change into some dry, warm clothes.
After you've changed and eaten, the trash still sitting on your desk because it's too damn cold out to go to the trash can, you pull out your Japanese book and try to study. The teacher's got a bad habit of giving quizzes every single day, and you have several vocab words and a couple pages of kanji to memorize.
Something seems to be wrong with the light in your room. It's flickered twice now, and both times, something outside your window throws up a weird shadow on your wall. It almost looks like a gnarled, twisted tree, reaching out for your throat. But it's nothing, right?
Suddenly, from outside your window, a light flares up. It's coming from the shrine up on the hill, the one you explored over the weekend. You know, back when the weather was nice. The light doesn't seem to be dying down, and it's too steady to be from a fire.
You exit into the hall to see if anyone else has noticed, but there's no one around. Shrugging, you decide to go and investigate alone. You're not tired, even though it's kind of late, and for some reason, you're now afire with curiosity.
It's stopped raining. The stars are even out, though this close to the city, you can't see many of them. The moon doesn't hang in the sky, and you seem to recall that it's a new moon tonight. You walk up the street to the shrine, where you can still faintly see the light. It's pale and soft, not quite like anything you've ever seen before. It seems to be coming from one of the tori, the gates that overlook the entrance to this little wooded area that houses the shrine.
As you stand in front of it, you wonder why there isn't anyone else around. The light is nearly blinding here, and it's taking up the whole archway. This...isn't natural, to say the least. Is it some kind of trick the locals do? You haven't heard about anything like this, and there's no one else around. What is this?
Suddenly, a dark shape springs from the light at you. You see the glint of razor-sharp claws and talons before time seems to slow and a voice rings in your head.
I am Thou. Thou art I. The time has come. Open thine eyes and call forth what is within!
"Per...so...na!"
------
Cue kickin' guitar. Yeah, that last bit is shamelessly ripped off from the Persona-Get! scene in Persona 4. Also, aside from a few minor details, what I described is very similar to how I'm actually living here.
I don't know if I'd want to take this further. I don't have any sort of overarcing plot laid out, nor do I have any idea for characters. In fact, this whole thing is written in the second person to avoid characterization. Based on what little fiction I've written, I have a horrible habit of turning basically every main or viewpoint character into myself, as I find it really hard to come up with scenarios that don't directly involve myself. I don't want to just be mindlessly parroting my own method of thinking into text, so I deliberately went for a style that avoids getting into my protagonist's head. I don't know, I'll see what my brain comes up with.
So! This has given me a bit of an idea for a sort of fanfic based off of the idea I posted earlier. Here's my intro for Persona 5:
-----
The train pulls into the station, and you hear the familiar jingle as the doors open- or you would, if you didn't have your headphones on, the music blasting. It's been about a week since you moved into the dormitory at the bottom of the hill. Since then you've gotten used to the route home. The ramen stand bustling with customers, and wafting out a scent that makes your mouth water. Unfortunately, you're on a budget and all you've got is the cheap instant shit at home. That one big house that would be sizeable even in America- here, it is monstrous. Another train, laden with weary commuters, roars by, the rattling shaking your teeth. It's cold, and your jacket is pulled around you as the rain drips past your face. You should have packed that heavier jacket, but you weren't supposed to need it and you needed the space in your suitcase. So you hurry through the rain, looking forward to your warm room and hot dinner.
An overpass spans the path, creating a narrow tunnel you must walk down. Bikes and scooters carrying tired commuters home pass you by, indifferent to one more hooded figure, moving too fast to even tell that you're a gaijin. Unlike the rest of this whole town, the lights here are in poor condition- they're dim and flickering. You're looking down at the pavement, music still blaring in your ears, trying to ignore the water still falling in front of you.
Out of the corner of your eye, you see a shape. It's not even remotely human- long, spindly arms reaching out to grasp at you, a slavering mouth gaping. You turn suddenly, and it's gone. All you see is the dirty graffiti on the wall, and all you hear is the thumping bass and screeching guitars that your headphones continue to pour into your ears. You shrug, and turn back to your walk home. Probably just a shadow on the wall caused by a passing biker.
The wind picks up as you exit the tunnel, blowing the rain horizontally in your face. This is miserable. As you walk down the street towards your dorm, you have to squeeze to the side of the road to prevent yourself from being run over by the drivers who take these narrow streets at ludicrous speeds. They splash your legs as they drive through the puddles.
As the music on your headphones fades out, the guiter making one last, haunting note, you swear you hear a faint voice emenating from them:
I am thou. Thou art I.
It is just on the edge of hearing, and quickly dismissed as the warm light of the dorm washes over you.
Your friend Brian- he's in your History of Tokyo class- comes up as you take your shoes off.
"How's it been? Cold as hell, isn't it?"
You mumble a response and head for your room, desperate to change into some dry, warm clothes.
After you've changed and eaten, the trash still sitting on your desk because it's too damn cold out to go to the trash can, you pull out your Japanese book and try to study. The teacher's got a bad habit of giving quizzes every single day, and you have several vocab words and a couple pages of kanji to memorize.
Something seems to be wrong with the light in your room. It's flickered twice now, and both times, something outside your window throws up a weird shadow on your wall. It almost looks like a gnarled, twisted tree, reaching out for your throat. But it's nothing, right?
Suddenly, from outside your window, a light flares up. It's coming from the shrine up on the hill, the one you explored over the weekend. You know, back when the weather was nice. The light doesn't seem to be dying down, and it's too steady to be from a fire.
You exit into the hall to see if anyone else has noticed, but there's no one around. Shrugging, you decide to go and investigate alone. You're not tired, even though it's kind of late, and for some reason, you're now afire with curiosity.
It's stopped raining. The stars are even out, though this close to the city, you can't see many of them. The moon doesn't hang in the sky, and you seem to recall that it's a new moon tonight. You walk up the street to the shrine, where you can still faintly see the light. It's pale and soft, not quite like anything you've ever seen before. It seems to be coming from one of the tori, the gates that overlook the entrance to this little wooded area that houses the shrine.
As you stand in front of it, you wonder why there isn't anyone else around. The light is nearly blinding here, and it's taking up the whole archway. This...isn't natural, to say the least. Is it some kind of trick the locals do? You haven't heard about anything like this, and there's no one else around. What is this?
Suddenly, a dark shape springs from the light at you. You see the glint of razor-sharp claws and talons before time seems to slow and a voice rings in your head.
I am Thou. Thou art I. The time has come. Open thine eyes and call forth what is within!
"Per...so...na!"
------
Cue kickin' guitar. Yeah, that last bit is shamelessly ripped off from the Persona-Get! scene in Persona 4. Also, aside from a few minor details, what I described is very similar to how I'm actually living here.
I don't know if I'd want to take this further. I don't have any sort of overarcing plot laid out, nor do I have any idea for characters. In fact, this whole thing is written in the second person to avoid characterization. Based on what little fiction I've written, I have a horrible habit of turning basically every main or viewpoint character into myself, as I find it really hard to come up with scenarios that don't directly involve myself. I don't want to just be mindlessly parroting my own method of thinking into text, so I deliberately went for a style that avoids getting into my protagonist's head. I don't know, I'll see what my brain comes up with.
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