Orius

Just found this song by one of my favorite performers of all time, Blue Stahli: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9UtRXIFPzo Gotta love that fast-paced adrenaline-pumper!

Aside from Chiikaboom's Devil's Game that I posted in the "Daily Music Thread", there's also this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3cZbQaqYN4 I was so glad I found this when I did. It's such an appropriate insert song for the depressing world of Madoka. "Nocte of desperatio" is right. I always tear up a bit at the bridge of the song, where you can hear references to "Inevitabilis", my favorite Madoka OST. For the Madoka fans, see if you could recognize what that 'clap' sound at the end of the video is.

I could listen to this all day long: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ftm953BUQj8 Angels have faith I don't want to be a part of his sin I don't want to get lost in his world I'm not playing this game

I want to say Death Note, but me and everyone else have said that before so many times in threads like this in other forums, so let's pick something else: Pokemon XY. Ash losing the League. Again. Of course, it wouldn't have been disappointing if they hadn't built up that hype! He was SO close! God! He was in the finals! Just a little bit more and the franchise would break new grounds for the first time! And that Mega Charizard battle was terribly unfair! It went against so many of Ash's Pokemon before, and it STILL managed to come out standing at the end. What the heck? Talk about being an overrated lizard. We all know the only reason Mega Charizard was there was to pander to the Genwunners and to promote the in-game Mega Charizard. It's a promotional scheme, that's all! Of course they couldn't let their precious marketing go to waste! Sighyaka... In that one moment, Pokemon fans everywhere slammed their head on the desk. Such a crushing disappointment by the most disappointing Pokemon trainer, ever.

This reminds me of Umaru-chan. When I saw that chibi character, I put the anime in my "Plan to Watch" list quickly because she looks so cute. Buuuut on the other hand, she's a chubby blob of moe chugging down soda. The thing with anime is that, "anime" and "moe" are practically interchangeable terms nowadays, with the over-saturation of moe/cutesy anime, and that saturation reminds me why I don't like too much of such character design. The moeblob's appearance every now and then is fine, but too much can ruin the mood and pacing during weightier and emotional moments in the story. Can you imagine Saber's final moments in Fate/Zero, when she's forced to witness the destruction of the Grail, and she has a 'chibi' moment? Too much of that stuff kills the mood. I personally prefer drama and thrillers any day over whatever moe Japan seems to be obsessed with, so if anime has too many chibi moments just to make people squeal at how supposedly "cutesy" the chibi is, it becomes off-putting and obnoxious. It's not even funny, like slapstick funny. It can look cute like a puppy would, but I think for me, even I would get bored if I'm forced to stare at a puppy all the time.

Checking back on this thread is kinda depressing. Not only is her last name spelled wrong in the poll, she only has a single vote, making her the least popular main character in the entire series. Sighyaka... Even after earning your redemption in Rebellion, you still can't catch a break.

Clannad, if it counts. Also one of my first anime. I think it established a lot of false expectations for me on what anime romance was supposed to look like. lol

It was so long ago. This is a question I always have trouble answering due to poor memory. All I could remember is that three of the anime I watched when I started watching anime as a hobby was: 1. Gurren Lagann 2. Hell Girl 3. Clannad I remember that the more mainstream titles that I chose (Death Note, FMA: Brotherhood, Ghost in the Shell, and Neon Genesis Evangelion) didn't come till later, when I was knowledgeable enough to know what's the hottest and most popular anime out there. Prior to that, I honestly can't remember why I picked those three. It's seven to eight years ago, when I was in college that I got into anime-watching due to my classmates' influence. We would watch them in class on our laptops. lol I was foolish enough to think that we were bonding over anime in class (I picked Evangelion later to show off how cool I was... pathetic). I think Death Note was the starting point for a lot of anime fans, and I think it was probably the recommendation that got me started watching anime as well, just not watching Death Note (till later), as weird as that sounds. My classmates were watching DN at the time, I think (again, blurred memory), and they would tell me how good it was. Of course, I didn't know what anime was at the time, or that I've already been exposed to anime long before anime was a thing in my life. And that brings me to my real "first" anime, the one that I had watched before anime-watching became a hobby. When I was much younger, I think my first anime was Akazukin Chacha. It was this cute magical girl anime, of which the protagonist is loosely based on Little Red Riding Hood. Go figure. And of course, a lot of people's childhood anime, Dragon Ball, was also one of mine. I remember buying a lot of the manga till one day, I couldn't find any copies of it anymore at my local comics shop. And that's when I was exposed to my favorite childhood anime of all time... That's when I found one manga sitting among the others, piquing my interest... And thus, a fandom was born!!! 20 years of following that anime. 20 long years. God, can't believe how long it has been. But I can't go on without mentioning another important "first" anime that occupied my childhood: Digimon Adventure. Before Detective Conan became my obsession, I was a huge Digimon fanatic, fighting against Pokemon fans in the Mon-Wars of the '90s. I remember that there was this really stupid marathon they had on a local channel. They were showing Digimon and Pokemon back-to-back, telling the viewers to vote for their favorite to see which was more popular... Naturally, even among Singaporeans, Pokemon was the more popular one. Sigh. Oh well. Nonetheless, my passion for Digimon continued to burn strongly for many years to come, till the day when Digimon actually excelled over Pokemon in terms of better story when Digimon Tamers was born, the third almighty season with mature storytelling and complex characters. Pokemon wouldn't have such gritty and grounded stories till Diamond and Pearl arrive much later, but that's a topic for another day. It's always fun to walk down the nostalgia lane like this every now and then. I have many precious memories of my first anime, and how they made me love the culture and the medium as a whole today. If I could return to the past and do it all over again, be that naive little kid just finding out what anime is, boy would I love to.

Either which is fine for me, but I do tend to prefer forums. Chats can be kinda intense. They're real-time, so you don't have as much time to type out your replies as you would a forum reply. I mean, I remember conversations in chats with multiple people where I replied to an older comment, but that comment was already overshadowed by other comments that were jumping onto a new topic. It's hard to catch up sometimes. With this forum, it's not as much of a problem because of a lack of people, but I do still remember times when I just browse away to other parts of the forum, giving up on a conversation that I couldn't follow. Also, chats have a certain way to suck me in for long hours. With forums, I feel like I have much more control over when I could stop replying to the next topic, etc. But in chats, you have a real person talking to you on the other end, pressuring you to reply in the next moment or risk leaving an awkward silence behind. I just couldn't stand the thought of that. If you and I are talking offline, and we get one of those awkward silences, you know I will talk about anything trivial just to ensure that silence is voided. It's a frustrating habit some people don't have a problem of, lucky them. Some people could just spend a quiet moment with another individual, not talking or feeling anxious. And besides, you get all these cool "ratings" you can tag people's posts with! Winner! Like! Dislike... the one tag I've rarely seen people use, unsurprisingly.

I have a "hugging pillow", but it's not the dirty hentai body-pillow mentioned here. It's just a generic bolster with an ordinary cover, no cute girl. Unfortunately, I've had a habit of sleeping while hugging a pillow since I was a kid. It's kinda embarrassing, but I can't imagine sleeping without something soft hugged against my face.

I want to say my waifu, Sayaka from Madoka, but unfortunately, she's the opposite of popular. Sigh. Sigh-yaka. jaja Popular characters that I like... Gintoki from Gintama, Conan from Detective Conan, and Saber from Fate/Zero (though everyone and their mother prefers Rin for whatever reasons...), that's it. My other favorite characters aren't super popular, or are just borderline popular (Celty from Durarara, Kino from Kino's Journey, and Kyubey... yes, Kyubey).

Hm, I'll give it a try some time. Thanks for the tip.

I don't know. I'm not really good at cooking, and the whole process is just "put nuggets in toaster oven, turn a dial, and cook", so I don't know if adding combustible oil in an oven is such a good idea... lol That said, I really need to get a proper microwave oven someday, so I can heat up some REAL meals. I know you can cook much tastier meals with a microwave as opposed to a toaster oven, which is more limited in its capability.

Google Chrome (or insert any Internet browser you prefer here). I don't use apps much, so that's the only program I couldn't live without, the very thing that allows me to access the Internet.

Chicken nuggets, heated up with a toaster oven. It's a lot less delicious than it sounds. There's barely any oil in it, so any juicy texture resembling McDonald's nuggets doesn't exist. It's stale meat. Ugh.

I'm afraid that's just the way it is with modern gaming. Some modern inventions are annoying to certain individuals, such as the smartphone, or how every movie has to be in 3-D nowadays. I'm afraid that, as long as people are paying like blind sheep - and you bet they will - the trend will carry on. It only stops when the marketers see that the sales have gone down, and not just for a single game's DLCs, but for a large amount of them. Unfortunately, that's just an idealistic situation I don't see happening. Mob mentality is such an awesome trait of humanity, isn't it? Personally, I don't like it either, DLCs. I think it's cheap marketing, and it encourages gaming studios to be lazier than they already are. "Let's just churn out an unfinished product so that we can complete it later on with DLCs and patches." It's shameless and unethical. I'm actually quite amazed how weak-minded game developers are to be swayed by the power of money like that. I mean, I'm dirt-poor as heck, so I'm in no position to talk about money being unimportant, but c'mon, you game companies make millions every year. Even avarice has a limit in 2017. That said, I can only complain on some Internet forum. No power of mine will change a thing about game developers and how they do business. The keyword here is business, and that's the only thing they see video games as, a business. Micro-transactions will continue because it's good business. They won't suddenly grow a heart and say, "Man, would I like to change the gaming industry this morning! Howdy doo!" So, I just have to suck it up and buy games to distract me from my otherwise mundane and meaningless life. It's a vicious circle we cannot escape...

The thing is, repairing it would be really expensive, and it doesn't help that I have the habit of misplacing my personal belongings, including the warranty to the console, meaning that I would have to pay to get the thing repaired. It also doesn't help that the repair will take a long time. The reason I want to get it repaired in the first place is because I need my gaming console! I ain't got the patience to wait around for the repair! Thus, 9 out of 10 times, I would definitely buy a new one instead out of impatience. That's just the way I roll. *shrugs* Of course, I would take the effort to ensure it doesn't get broken in the first place. Sometimes, when my console gets broken anyway due to my carelessness, like my iMac's broken monitor (I can no longer adjust the angle I want the monitor to face), I would just make do with manual adjustments, like putting a platform underneath the monitor to set it to the angle I want. It's not the best solution - heck, it's barely a solution at all - but it lets me carry on with my life.

I don't usually play obviously bad games that are devoid of any quality whatsoever, so it's hard for me to really name them. The "bad" games I do play are those with good graphics and music, high production value and stuff, but with bad game design or a mediocre story that bores me to tears. I don't care if I'm killing people in a dozen different methods for six hours if the story is blend and generic - or worse, if there is no story at all to distract me. It's why I dropped Borderlands as soon as I picked it up. It was kinda "fun", I guess, getting different weapons and upgrading them, but it just felt repetitive and routine after a while, grinding my way around just to get more guns and kill some more. But at least Borderlands has the excuse of not being suitable for my particular taste, so it's not really a "bad game" per se. A truly bad game that immediately comes to mind... I can't believe I'd say it, but Bioware games. The newer titles. Aside from the obvious glitches, Mass Effect: Andromeda was a snooze fest. The story and characters are already dull and uninteresting, but the meaningless side quests made things ten times worse. It feels very much like Dragon Age: Inquisition: devoid of life. When your NPCs and quests are as robotic as this, it makes the universe in the RPG feel monotonous and not fun to explore. There's no color or variety to it because it's just generic fetch-quests after generic fetch-quests. Dragon Age: Inquisition, however, is FAR, FAR worse. It forces you to do those painful side quests in order to earn power points that you need to move the story forward! What the heck, Bioware?! I couldn't stand the prison I was trapped in by this corporate BS so I dropped the game before I could complete it, even though I paid loads of money for the GotY Edition! Jesus! Game of the Year my big fat granny hinny! And the story, god, it's like Bioware's creative think-tank has depleted since Mass Effect 3's god-awful ending. The Kett are awful villains, generic grunts no better than your average Krogan enemy mobs. Their motivation towards spiritual and religious enlightenment could have been interesting were it not for their megalomaniacal leader, the Archon, stealing the spotlight all the way through. It's like we're dealing with Lord Zedd here! In short, Bioware has created some of the most god-awful games since 2014, Inquisition's release date. They belong in the same bargain bin where what remains of No Man's Lie is probably resting in pieces. In comparison, there are some really glitchy games that have fantastic game design mixed in them, such as Alpha Protocol. Even though Mass Effect Andromeda looks and sounds good, it pales in comparison compared to the much more exciting Alpha Protocol, where your choices ACTUALLY matter. Yeesh. EA should just let Obsidian Entertainment take over both the Mass Effect and Dragon Age franchise if it has any business sense left amidst that greed.

Same. Between the two games mentioned in the opening post, Fatal Frame scared me a lot more than Silent Hill (or rather, SH2, since I never played the first one). SH2 was more "disturbing" than "scary". That said, Fatal Frame's "scary" was more like provoking my nerves, my impulse, and my anxieties than actual psychological scares like Silent Hill, so there's that. I hate jump scares because of that. They're so cheap and devoid of value. That being said, Fatal Frame's gameplay was interesting enough that I would love to finish it someday. Other than that, there was this other annoying game called "The Park". It's supposed to be a spin-off of this MMO called "The Secret World". One particular part of the game I liked was the swan ride, where a creepy version of Hansel and Gretel was told. I always love it when people tell the grimmer versions of the original fairy tales rather than give it a "Disney" spin, so that won me over easily. The atmosphere build-up during that ride was awesome too. No jump scares or anything. I don't think there was actually a lot of jump scares in there, now that I think about it, and more like the expectation that there was supposed to be jump scares because god, the atmosphere of that game was creepy. A lot of scenes were silent, and you don't know what will come out around the corner. If you want to wet your pants, play this game in the dark. I dare you.

I used to have an aversion to Asian movies and just Asian culture in general. Despite being an Asian Chinese myself (or probably because of it), I found Asian culture terribly boring. Of course, this does not include Japanese culture and Japanese movies for some reason, probably because Japan incorporated much more "western" (AKA American) elements into their culture than China and Hong Kong. But over the last 6 years or so, I have been more open to Asian films. I really liked the original version of Infernal Affairs. The American remake, The Departed, was a good attempt at westernizing the story, but I felt like it missed a lot of the spiritual themes from the franchise. It's a movie called "Infernal" Affairs, after all. There was a lot of stuff related to karmic retribution and redemption that The Departed couldn't capture. The third Infernal Affairs was unfortunately a mess, but I felt like it presented that theme more obviously than the rest of the movies, particularly due to Andy Lau's character coming to terms with what he have done in the first film. Looking back now, I was actually a bigger fan of Asian cinema as a kid because my parents would force me to watch them, and thus, exposing me to their influence. But as I grew up and watched my own movies, I started paying more attention to American cinema, particularly those explosive blockbusters like Terminator, Aliens, Predator, etc. They were just more showy and fantastical than the more subtle and grounded Asian movies, a trait I still favor today among American movies. That said, I still have fond memories of certain Asian movies. For starters, I loved Chow Yun-Fat and God of Gamblers. So badass: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mibGBsWF4E0 That iconic theme is unforgettable. There was something about "hard-boiled" heroes with the weight of the world on their shoulders that Asian cinema likes to mix with gambling for some reason. lol I remember watching this local TV serial as a kid, also a gambling show, where the protagonist is much like Chow Yun-Fat, a gritty hero with enemies everywhere. You can see the entire pilot episode here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZxpY_G3nHg Very intense stuff. Russian Roulette with gunfire and mayhem... along with some gambling on the side. lol I also really liked Stephen Chow's older films. They were great comedies, though I did prefer some of Jim Carrey's movies over Steph's (Liar Liar was great). I think my favorite Stephen film was "From Beijing with Love". Even though he still played a goof, it was his coolest role to date as a parody of James Bond: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKcfD19xAtE Hong Kong was doing Austin Powers way earlier than America, it seems. lol There was also an emotional touch to the story, much like a lot of HK flicks, that I enjoyed. And last but not least, who could forget Jackie Chan? Also loved his older flicks a lot when I was younger. My favorite was one that I grew up with: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PTTRQIFO7U Needless to say, the trailer really emphasized how hyperbolic and cheesy the plot was. That was one reason why I stopped liking his films when I got older, because they just got way too silly for me, especially his American-starring works. I am disappointed, however, that the trailer didn't use the really awesome theme song from Thunderbolt: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-OOwWwixGw

1. Navy-blue. It's a "cool" color. Get it? lol... I'll see myself out. 2. Hard to say. Black and blue are both cool and badass colors that go well together, but black goes well with almost every other dark colors as well, even yellow (Celty's helmet from Durarara, for example, looks great). 3. Vegetables, maybe. Green looks kinda revolting for something that already tastes bad. I'm a fussy eater. What can I say? *shrugs*

Only child, for all that it's worth. I wish I have siblings. I know it's probably one of those "the grass is greener" thing, but I feel like I could have someone else to support me on an emotional level if I have a sibling, someone to count on when things get tough. Friends are nice and all, but they only last till things go bad. Blood is thicker than water, as they say.

9 in real life. Maybe a 6 or 7 online, seeing as I still have a few online acquaintances. Yep, I'm every textbook version of a filthy unpopular otaku you'd see in anime... Sigh. I'm hitting 30 soon, currently at 27, and I did contemplate when I'm going to get laid by going to dating events. Of course, those never worked out well, and I'm too self-conscious (insecure lol) to talk to the girls. Ugh. Strangely, or perhaps not so strange, I can confess all these embarrassing stuff online, because living in some hick Asian country thousands of miles away, I know you and I will never meet.

Some really old photos: [spoiler=Shameless] [spoiler=Aspiring Tarantino...] [spoiler=The latest out of the lot] Look at how smug that fellow is. Ugh.

As long as it's filled with my favorite anime. I know a lot of anime calendars with moe-girls and whatnot. Not really my thing, as "hot" as some of these images might be... <_<" It's the same reason I wouldn't get calendars with girls in bikinis or even lesser clothing. It just doesn't have much meaning to me. I just don't have that need for a masturbation-aid staring at me 24/7. lol There are appropriate times for these kinds of stuff, after all.