Watched up to Season 2 of Dexter last week, watching Heroes season 3 at the moment.

Fuck me.

So... what the fuck? I avoided watching this anime for years now, especially after being turned off and sickened by the piece of shit ending that the manga had. I pretty much spent all day today watching the entirety of Angelic Layer on Netflix, and wow, they actually delivered the emotional and thematic expectations that the manga failed to do anything with.

I teared up a few times, too.

I mean, its by no means the most awesome anime ever, but it keeps you captivated with very little recycled animation, and the story has no filler content. It delivers.

I think a friend actually told me to check it out, and that the anime's ending was superior to the manga, but I dismissed the notion of ever checking out anything related to Angelic Layer until now. It helped that I completely forgot what happens in the manga, too, though I do still recall a few small details. In fact, the thing that I remember the most is how stupid and bubbly they made her mother at the end of the manga, and my disgust towards how poorly the manga ended (to the point of selling the entire collection for roughly $25-30).

But yeah...

In other news, I've had a desire to draw and create, and its an impulse I've felt missing for a very, very long time

After years of not following up on the manga, despite starting sometime during highschool, I went by my local library and got volumes 5-9, and just finished a few hours ago.

To say the least, it had me laughing, it had me squealing, and it had me a little down. Reading it took me back to a time when I cared more, and in turn, I put out more creative energy. It reminded me of a time when I talked with more people, when I was involved with more people, and when I was in the thick of what could have been. I cheered for the characters, and I laughed at their reactions. I watched a man settle for less simply because he knew he couldn't get what he wanted, and that depressed me.

To see some of these characters so fleshed out in my mind, only more so because of my own experience in the lives of others, made me long for the faces of those who I haven't seen or talked with in ages.

It made me reflect upon my own flaws and ego, and my repeated mistakes and my guard. My lack of happiness and my libido.

I've deprived myself of the world and people by pushing them away. Opportunities ruined by self-destruction.

I am NEET, and I revel in it not.

So... I don't know what I'm doing, because I'm in desperate need of a job, but in the past month or two, I've bought like... 5 games or something, which is way more than the same time last year (when I had no job). I got laid off, and I've been pissing away time since.

Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm was something I'd wanted to pick up for a while now. Graphically, its bloody gorgeous. Best looking cell shading/painted background textures I've seen in ever. Closest thing I'd compare it to is what they did in the film "Steamboy" and the texture work they did there for the 3D scenes.

As a game, though, it falls a part. You can tell they put just a load of their budget and time into faithfully recreating the Konoha village, and animating the characters, but little else. The game suffers from balancing issues, and there is a distinct lack of variety in mission types in the singleplayer story.

Another ninja game I got was Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2. To say the least, its the most balanced action game that I've played in the past few years. Not once was I overly frustrated, but yet at the same time, it was challenging and gratifying. Truly, the Path of the Warrior difficulty setting is tuned to a T. The online co-op is really awesome and fun, too.

More recently, I just finished Dead Space. It reminded me a lot of the first Alien film, a long with a healthy dosing of the isolation and feeling of being in space in a 3D environment that the first Metroid Prime did so well with its opening sequence. But mostly because of that, the gothic interior design really reminded me a lot of Alien, along with the idea of being a regular Joe miner guy.

I have Demon's Souls sitting near me, but its collecting dust because I fucked up and decided that I would try a new save (and remake my character a 3rd time). I think I can beat that giant fat guy at the end of the tutorial level. I just need to remember to not use unknown hero souls during 1-1...

Finally, while I don't have it with me, I have the Watchmen something or other PS3 game/movie bluray combo thing on its way. $20 for director's cut + 2 overpriced digitally distributed games? Sure, why not.

I wish there was a Mood for "not depressed," cuz I'm on Zoloft atm :S

Oh, and finally: People need to watch Son of Rambow, its awesome

So I finally got the game today, and I just beat it half an hour ago on "Normal."

Overall, its a pleasant game, with some really great high points, but a lot of frustrating low points. Honestly, I wish the game would actually give me a lot of the moves you learn later from the beginning, primarily the aerial sword attacks.

As an action game, I think it does a lot of interesting things, as it follows the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time school of thought in melding platforming with combat. It reminded me a lot of Mirror's Edge, Tomb Raider, and Devil May Cry, sprinkled heavily with Killer 7 and general popcorn grindhouse cinema. The result is a unique action game that tries a lot of things, like Tomb Raider-esque platforming, with Stranglehold/Max Payne slow-mo, and extra emphasis on keeping up your combo multiplier and time spent, reminding my tastebuds of Mirror's Edge in particular.

However, while the game borrows a lot of wonderful elements from the games mentioned above, it ironically does little to avoid the flaws and downfalls of all of those games. At times, the platforming can be frustrating, as well as certain kill boxes later in the game, which gets magnified by the rather dated checkpoint load times, in contrast to more recent games with faster loading. The clip of celluloid burning not meshing with your death didn't help either. It made me wish that they had taken a different approach to playing off of the whole film thing, like a jazzed up quick cut to the last checkpoint, instead of kicking you out to the loading screen.

There was one point during a kill box sequence where I accidently glitched and clipped back through a wall into the previous room that you originally open to enter the next area, but the game designers apparently had a solution for this (should it ever occur), by letting you reopen the door to no consequence. So clearly, they at least tested the game a fair bit.

However, I don't know if its because of my PS3 specifically, or because it was the PS3 version at all, but there were a lot of times where the game actually had discernable audio lag in the cutscenes, with the lips and voices not matching up. It was annoying, but ignorable. In fact, a lot of the technical faults of the game, like frame rate issues and chugging, felt visually masked by the film scratch filter and the presentation of the game, which I found myself noticing. Had this game not pursued its grindhouse presentation, its technical faults would be laid far more bare than they were. Truly, this is one of the few games out on the market where its technical flaws were chalked up by its developers as "features," and embraced as such, instead of choosing to make a polished experience.

So what does that mean, then, exactly? Does the charm and presentation of what WET's developers pursued forgive its unpolished nature, for the sake of presentation, or should all games be expected to run as best as they can, no matter the excuse?

The game did freeze at one point, but because I had my PS3 on all day, and played the game all day, I'll leave that alone, even though when I did start that part again, it did chug a lot.

But despite the game's questionable flaws, it has some magificent high points, as I said before, from the sky diving sequence, to the extended Rage sequence of chapter 11. The music selection and original content from various musicians were an incredible boon to the overall experience as well, but in contrast to those musical high points, the periods where music was absent made for a jarring experience as well.

I actually didn't mind the QTEs, as it gave plenty of slow mo time to let the player input the button, unlike some games that are notoriously unforgiving with their QTEs. I am a little disappointed that there was no actual combat highpoint, like an actual fight with bosses, instead of a QTE cutscene, but for what the game offered, I fully enjoyed how they played out.

The cliffhanger at the end was certainly a nice touch.

Do I wish that the game's enemies, "Rubi Vision" (the platforming assist "vision," not Rage mode), and the platforming had been a bit more polished and elaborated upon? Certainly, but as A2M's first true original IP outing (as their website will give testament to their history of licensed games), I think they did a wonderful job, and I hope they take what they've learned from making WET, and apply it to something even better for whatever they make next.