Oh Bioware and your sh!$$y customer service

So I have been on hold for literally 3 hours now trying to get my early access to the new expansion that I paid for within the bounds of their deadline. It should be a simple "Oh you did pay and receive a conf. email on the 7th of Jan. Let me enable this for you." Done it would be that easy but no here I sit typing this out and still waiting for someone to pick up. Even the in-game service is slow and I have yet to receive a response there or even on the forums. Seriously thinking about canceling my sub this is the worst service I have ever encountered.

More New Airing Anime Initial Thoughts: "Namiuchigiwa no Muromi-san", "Zettai Bouei Leviathan", "Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai", "Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru" and "Shingeki no Kyojin"

So I have watched pretty much everything that has been released thus far and I have to say that although there is some crap mixed in, there are a couple shows that I just know I will end up liking.

So starting with the not so impressive we have Namiuchigiwa no Muromi-san. It is going to be using the twelve minute format rather than the full twenty four so I initially wasn’t going to get my hopes up. This is however going to be that super raunchy and perverted show (may not be the only one) for this season. All of the jokes are sexual based and while every second of the show tries to throw in some sort of gag, I did find myself somewhat enjoying it. The animation was actually to my liking; the lighting is very well done and the overall design of the scenes seems pretty unique. I cannot really say anything else about this show just yet; for now it will stay on my watch list.

Next on the not so sure list is Zettai Bouei Leviathan. This show is going to essentially boil down to a trio of girls who will most likely go on some sort of adventure together in order to defeat the bad guys. The three main characters seem to work well with each other so hopefully the story flows well. The animation is pretty average but with some good aspects slipping in like lighting and the fight scenes. So far all I can tell is that this is going to be your average comedic adventure.

Now the next show is one that I did not enjoy very much when it first aired but for some reason I feel sorta obligated to watch it. Ore no Imouto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai is the bother sister comedy from 2010 that send a shockwave throughout the anime community. While there are a vast amount of supporters for this show, I just cannot get behind a show that has such a repulsing main character. This character Kirino is the reason why I hope to god I do not have a girl if I ever decide to have children. I do not get why anyone would like her she is abusive, manipulative, and two faced. In some positive news the animation seems to have gotten a slight boost from its previous season. Reflections are nicely done and the character models look great. I’ll be sticking this one out just so I can write a horrid review on it in the end.

Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru (god these anime titles are getting longer and longer) while not coming off as crap certainly did not come off amazing. The first thing I noticed was that the main male character looks exactly like the one from Sankarea. He even has somewhat the same personality. Essentially our main character is forced to join a club due to his last of effort on an assignment. In this club, he and the club leader must help people that come for assistance (Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakama-tachi anyone?). Umm the chemistry between the two club members seems to be good so hopefully they will bring some interesting moments. Animation is ok nothing else to really say on that. Looks like it has potential to be good so I’ll stick this one out.

Ok so the one anime that has just screamed out at me as something worth watching is Shingeki no Kyojin. The entire episode does a great job setting up what the focus of the entire season is going to be; revenge. While the whole “I must avenge my family” thing has been done a billion times, I honestly felt for the main character when sh!@ got real towards the end of the episode. The main character seems head strong and actually has balls unlike some other male protagonists. The animation is very good as the giant titans look amazing and all the shots done at sunset have an amazing quality due to the lighting. If you are going to pick one anime to watch this season I would put your money on this one. It looks like it is going to be a straight up action bloodbath will no unnecessary ecchi stuff thrown in.

New Airing Anime Initial Thoughts: "Aku no Hana" and "Devil Survivor 2"

So the new anime have started rolling out and I am still in the process of deciding what I will stick with. Of the plethora amount of new airing anime, I have only seen episode one of Aku no Hana and Devil Survivor 2 and I have to say they both seem pretty unique.

Starting with Aku no Hana I really don’t know what to think about it so far. I was very interested within the first two minutes due to the very unique animation style and the very airy and engaging piano track that gets repeated throughout the episode. The animation is shooting for a much more realistic approach rather than what most anime try to go for (you know super slender character models with outrageous bust sizes with lights and reflections going crazy). It depicts a much more real feeling Japan since the atmosphere feels much blander and you see many different characters with very different statures. The animation itself though I am not a huge fan of. The refresh rate is quite low so when you see a character changing their expression, it is not a smooth transition at all. Also whether or not you see facial features is totally dependent on how far away a certain character is from wherever the camera is. So if a character is walking towards the camera, you will see a blank face from far away but as they approach closer and closer, you will see the eyes then the mouth. It is unique I will give them that but all in all it is quite distracting. As far as the plot goes, I cannot really comment on it since I don’t know what the fu#@ is going to happen.

Devil Survivor 2 as far as I can tell is going to feel a lot like Xam’d: Lost Memories since they seem to have the same general plot device. We essentially have three fish out of water characters that are forcefully introduced and thrown into a situation they did not want but they will have to learn how to deal with it. Each of the main three characters was involved in a train crash that should have killed them. They were given the option to live on and thus they were granted these “avatars” to use in whatever situation they see fit. They end up fighting different monsters that they just label “demons” and at the end of episode one, they are arrested by some government type people. Right off the bat I was really digging the animation. The scenes are bright and have some awesome reflections especially off of the eyes. Speaking about the eyes, I love how they are drawn. I cannot tell you why I like them so much it’s just a personal quality I like about animation. The sound was good at best; I like the voice actors but the music seems kind of generic thus far. Characters start to grow closer to each other as the episode progresses so I hope they keep up the character development throughout later episodes.

Out of these two anime I can already tell that this anime season is going to (hopefully) bring much more than the typical high school drama stuff that we got force fed last season. As more anime get released I will try to comment on each one and by early next week I should have a list of what anime I plan to stick with. Also look for some more reviews on last season’s anime sometime this weekend.

Winter Anime Season Review

Well guys (and of course gals) this past anime season has pretty much ended with some mixed feelings. It way by far one of the most moe filled ones I have ever taken part in and while a couple shows caught my attention in the beginning, most of them ended up being average in my books. My early pick for favorites Kotoura-san, OreShura, and Maoyuu Maou Yuusha all ended up disappointing my overall expectations. I had extremely high hopes for both Kotoura-san and OreShura but they both took their interesting premise and awesome first episodes and just decided to go full on blaaa shortly after. Maoyuu Maou Yuusha started out ok and never really rose above or below that so overall I wasn't too disappointed in that particular instance. The other shows however ended up even worse than these three. Sasami-san in my honest opinion was just a huge mess trying to be clever, Problem Children started out decent but never "wowed" me, and the new season of Boku wa Tomodachi was just average since nothing really progressed. I picked up Suki-tte Ii na yo pretty late on so it was kind of enjoyable since I was able to speed watch the entire series but I feel as if it would of been a little worse if I had to wait an entire week for the next episode since each one did not progress very far. (I am such a noob since I just realized that Suki-tte Ii na yo aired during the fall season of last year...) Ahhh and the total crap anime award goes to Da Capo III since I never liked it at any point during the season. I mean come on the only people who are going to like this are the people who played the games. The anime was so completely lifeless and I had absolutely 0% invested feelings towards any of the characters. AND THE ENDING OMG (mouse over to see the hidden text) "Uhhh well I don't want to choose one of you so lets all stay friends." God I hate protagonists who cannot make a decision.

Well anyways the only shows I genuinely ended up liking were Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo and Tamako Market for their characters ability to provide interesting scenes. Also the soundtrack in Tamako Market might be the best one I have heard in anime [sorry Aria :(]. I haven't finished Initial D: Fifth Stage yet since it seems very hard to find them but I pretty much like it even if it feels the most lifeless out of all the Initial D's. As for reviews I have already uploaded ones for Tamako Market, Kotoura-san, and Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo and I intend on trying to put out a review for each anime I watched this season (people HAVE to know to avoid Da Crapo). This season was a disappointment overall but had a few hidden gems. I haven't really looked at what to watch for this coming season so here I go hoping that there are some decent ones -___-.