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Friday, November 20, 2009

Umineko no Naku Koro ni Character Song CD Vol.2 - Beatrice & George



Umineko no Naku Koro ni Character Song CD Vol.2 - Beatrice & George Ushiromiya [Sayaka Ohara & Kenichi Suzumura]

tracklist:
01 Chain / チェイン
02 ai no sengen / 愛の○○宣言
03 Anthology Drama ''Beatrice no koi no magic daisakusen'' /アンソロジードラマ「ベアトリーチェの恋のマジカル大作戦」
04 Chain / チェイン off vocal
05 ai no ○○ sengen / 愛の○○宣言 off vocal

download: [MU]
*credit to sakurahana for the album*
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finally vol 2 is out : D But to be honest I didn't really expect it to combine Beato and George together in this character song single (I would rather see Beato and Battler, but who doesn't). Seriously why Beato-George pairing, it just doesn't feel right D : Well it probably has something to do with the anthology drama I suppose (Geoge being lovey dovey with Shannon, and as usual Beato come to join the party). By the way, I love Beato's song :3



related posts:

RD - Umineko compilation Part 1 (dead links)
RD - Umineko compilation Part 2 - Umineko Motion Graphics
RD - Umineko collection part 3: Nekomaneki Kagekidan/CircleTempo
RD - Shikata Akiko - Katayoku no Tori [Umineko OP]
RD - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.1
RD - Umineko no Naku Koro ni Character Song CD Vol.1 - Jessica & Maria

Friday, November 13, 2009

Magna Carta 2 - the prologue



MagnaCarta II (マグナカルタ 2) is a video game developed by Softmax and published by Banpresto exclusively for Xbox 360. It is a follow-up to the role-playing games Magna Carta: The Phantom of Avalanche released on Windows and Magna Carta: Crimson Stigmata released on the PlayStation 2. It was released in Japan on August 6, 2009 and in North America on October 13, 2009. This marks the series' first entry onto a seventh generation console. The game was officially unveiled in the April 2009 edition of Famitsu magazine.
Links:
Magna Carta 2 on wikipedia
Magna Carta 2 official website (japanese)

Waiting for this game to be released could well be one of my worst experience in video gaming, not because of the anticipation like I had for eg. Star Ocean 4, but rather because of constant delaying of release date. First the game was announced to be released in the middle of September (an ideal time, right at the start of my mid-semester break), but then got delayed to early October. So I made my preorder on Play-Asia, but then the game got delayed AGAIN to Oct 23rd. To my demise, by the time this game is ready to be shipped, 2 other games that I preordered went out of stock (they were available when I made my pre-order btw). It's not until I sent them a few messages to separate my order that the game was finally shipped, and arrived at my home last Monday. But then, at the moment I am preparing for my final exam so it is not until yesterday that I was able to touch the game. Tough luck -.-

OK enough rubbish rant. I've managed to play up to 7 hours of the game before putting this game on hold for at least another week and focus on my 2nd exam paper. No need to remind me on how bad Magna Carta:Crimson Stigmata on PS2 is, I am well aware of the crappiness of the first installment (despite still able to finish the game completely). That however does not discourage me from being optimistic on Magna Carta 2, and from my 7 hours gameplay, I could well say that my anticipation paid off, Magna Carta 2 has improved significantly compared to its predecessor.



wait, isn't this place looks familiar?

The graphic and special effects in battle were beautiful as expected, I especially love the way they do the cutscenes (or rather, the dialogue sequences). Anyone who played Magna Carta 1 would be familiar with the character design (keyword: Hyung-Tae Kim). Talk about characters with weird clothes.. well at least this time the clothes are not as weird as those in Magna Carta.


GAMEPLAY


The actual gameplay of Magna Carta 2. The Overdrive, Chain, Chain Drive, Chain Break are demonstrated. Without proper timing, your character can easily go into Overheat state and trust me it's damn annoying. If you're familiar with them, you can recognize Jun Fukuyama and Hirano Aya voice in this video.

I'd probably just jump to the main thing I want to comment about - the gameplay. Since Magna Carta, the gameplay has changed massively, the only similar things remained are probably the interswitching from exploring to battle mode (remember those sphere thingy that you emit when you draw your sword, and you walk slowly in MC1), and the elements. No more of those annoying press-the-button circle upon action, Magna Carta 2 seems to shift into a semi-action rpg game. To be brief, I would say that the basic gameplay is similar to Infinite Undiscovery. Unique features are added to enhance the gameplay, and in this case, it is the Overdrive/ Overheat/ Chain system. Basically attacks consume stamina, and if you yoused up your stamina you enters Overdrive state (limit break/trance/overdrive in ff, sorta). Unfortunately, upon finishing your moves, you'll become exhausted and enters Overheat state, which is very annoying at the beginning. There is of course a way to overcome this, and that is by Chaining skill/transferring overdrive to other party member (Chain Drive/Chain Break). Too complicated to explain I guess.. But so far I enjoy the gameplay in MC2, much better than MC1. The only thing that I don't quite understand so far is the elemental attribute in battle (Element Kan/Alchemy). I thought it was some sort of Fon Circle as in Tales of the Abyss, but I am still not clear about this feature.


by the way, although I am a bit disappointed that the English version does not have the option to use Japanese voice (dammit there's Jun Fukuyama, Hirano Aya, Rie Kugimiya and Ayako Kawasumi!), the English voice acting aren't that bad either. Celestine's english voice is as annoying as Kugimiya, she did a good job in conveying those kinda of voice lawl.
And I love the casual comedies present in the game so far. Celestine always made me laugh with her warm and immature personality (and her weird taste too!) , and sometimes seeing Juto and Crocell's having a go at each other made me crack a laugh too.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Umineko collection part 3: Nekomaneki Kagekidan/CircleTempo



Title: ACTIVE PAIN
circle: Nekomaneki Kagekidan/猫招き歌劇団


tracklist:
1. ACTIVE PAIN
2. CORE BLUE
3. SHELTERING SKY
4. ACTIVE PAIN(alternative ver.)
5. ACTIVE PAIN(piano ver.)
6. ACTIVE PAIN(without vocal)
7. CORE BLUE(without vocal)
8. SHELTERING SKY(without vocal)
9. ACTIVE PAIN(EDsize)
download: [Megaupload]


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Title: DisCode
circle: Nekomaneki Kagekidan/猫招き歌劇団


tracklist:
01 - Prologue
02 - dai ichi shou Discode
03 - Interval-1
04 - dai ni shou tsukimu yoru ~Mid Night~
05 - Interval-2
06 - dai san shou chinkonka ga kikoe tekitanara ~REQUIEM~
07 - Epilogue
08 - Discode(alternative ver.)
09 - Discode(without vocal)
10 - tsukimu yoru ~Mid Night~(without vocal)
11 -chinkonka ga kikoe tekitanara ~REQUIEM~(without vocal)
12 - Discode(ED size)
download: [Megaupload]


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Title: Senritsu ~Shirabe~
circle: Nekomaneki Kagekidan/猫招き歌劇団


tracklist:
01 - Senritsu ~Shirabe~
02 - hadou ~konokoe~
03 - Senritsu ~Shirabe~(without vocal)
04 - hadou ~konokoe~(without vocal)
05 - Senritsu ~Shirabe~(game original ver.)
06 - Senritsu ~Shirabe~(piano ver.)
download: [Megaupload]


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Title: Sound of Golden Witch
circle: CircleTempo

tracklist:
01. Prologue
02. サソリのノウズイ
03. 胡散の香り
04. ロウソクたちが踊る
05. オトナノノミモノ
06. 魔女の頬杖
07. 白日夢の果て
08. キゲイト
09. HIBUTA
10. 木馬の頃
11. Happy Maria!
12. オルガン小曲第6億番ハ短調
13. オトコマン
14. 金色の嘲笑
15. サソリのハラワタ
16. ヨルーミ
17. あの日にふれたくて
18. 600 million ruins
download: [Megaupload]

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Title: Ougon Syndrome/黄金シンドローム

circle: CircleTempo


tracklist:
01 - ご来場の皆様へ
02 - Happy Maria!-BAND ARRANGE-
03 - ウサンノカオリ
04 - 大いなる金持ち
05 - 花園の崩壊
06 - Birth of a new witch
07 - 出演者よりお知らせ
08 - Happy Maria!-BAND ARRANGE-(off vocal)
09 - ウサンノカオリ(off vocal)
10 - 大いなる金持ち(off vocal)
11 - Birth of a new witch(off vocal)
download: [Megaupload]


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Active Pain and Sound of Golden Witch are reuploaded because the old link that I posted before in Umineko Compilation Part 1 were dead (in fact all links were dead o.0). Don't missed out 3 of the better Umineko songs from the visual novel - Active Pain, Discode and Senritsu Shirabe from Nekomaneki Kagekidan, while CircleTempo brought us the creepy hallowen song Happy Maria and the Band Arrange version. I've always love Discode and Shirabe from the old Umineko BGM collection (especially Shirabe's soothing melody), good to see that there's some other versions of the songs. Birth of a new Witch is not bad too, the singer's voice remind me to Asriel/Kokomi a lot, although she actually isn't.
btw, pardon the Ougon Syndrome's description, I upload it in a hurry a few days ago due to kiru's request lawl.

related posts:

RD - Umineko compilation Part 1 (dead links)
RD - Umineko compilation Part 2 - Umineko Motion Graphics
RD - Shikata Akiko - Katayoku no Tori [Umineko OP]
RD - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.1
RD - Umineko no Naku Koro ni Character Song CD Vol.1 - Jessica & Maria

DotaProClub Series #1 - summary

DPCS


DotaClub is a new online tournament that has been announced today. DotaClub's head admin is none other than Yaroslav 'NS' Kuznetsov, famous support player and founder of recently established Kael League.
The first DotaClub tournament features a $5,000 prize-pool, and in addition to the prize-pool, DotaClub has noted that they plan on continuing these tournaments on a regular basis.

The tournament take place from November 7-8.

Participating Teams and brackets:

  • Xeo Frenezy
    Unique E-Sports
    MYM
    Fnatic.MSI
    AEON.ru
    dmZ
    DTS.Chatrix
    EnRo-Griffins
DCPS Bracket

Tournament outcome:


  1. <span class= AEON.ru ($3000)
  2. dmZ ($1500)
  3. MYM ($500)

Links:
DCS official site
DCS1 bracket and replays
alternate replays@Gosugamers
Coverage@GosuGamers

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As mentioned, the tournament was held last weekend (Nov 7-8). It was unique in a way that despite being an online tournament, the format was made to be like LAN tournament where teams competes in playoff format, all within 2 days. Hence some teams could end up playing up to 6 games in a day, which could be tiresome if you ask me. Overall the tournament was successfull with some very good matches shown by the participated teams, producing some of the best replay I've ever seen in recent months. MYM, Fnatic and AEON.ru were among the favorites to win the tournament. MYM proved that they are still as strong as ever as they march on to take the third place, with their unexpected lose coming from their loser bracket against Germany team DmZ. AEON.ru meanwhile showed their prowess by losing only a single game (against MYM in the winner bracket) in the entire tournament. I have to say the addition of former KS.Int captain, Puppey's to the team adds extra depth to the team in term of stability and strategy, and this was shown with their subtle massive AOE domination strategy in their grand finalg ame against DmZ. Congratulations to AEON.ru for winning their first major tournament. I really hope eryc would consider taking them to this year's SMM.

Recommended replays:

loser bracket semi final, MYM vs Fnatic.
replay page: [download] (6.64, 1.24)
comment: WATCH. THIS. REPLAY. That's all I can say. Easily the best replay I've seen this month. MYM starts strongly, leading in kills 27-7 leaving no hopes for Fnatic to comeback. But I thought wrong. Fnatic then revives what was used to be a formidable strategy back in the old days of 6.1+, getting 5 necronomicon and started a massive push. In an instant, the tide of the game changed and suddenly MYM found themselves cornered and lost their top and middle rax. The teamfight was so chaotic that I couldn't see properly what was happening, with the amount of units involved. It's funny to see how ES blink in and ulti, and died in an instant due to Last Will. But it did not stop at that. MYM replies by massing Blade Mails to counter the blue demon's Last Will and overall Fnatic's massive push. It all thanks to massive performance by Tinker and earthshaker that MYM was able to hold their bottom rax and kill all 5 Fnatic heroes before going straight to throne.
Big credit to Fnatic for reviving such strategy and almost had the game if not because of ES and Tinker's amazing play by Kuroky and Angel. I would have thought that they could easily seal the game by using Pit Lord's portal and teleport straight to the tree to finish the game, but instead thei choose to take down MYM's bottom rax and was unsuccessful. Plus, since they were using 5 necronomicon strat, they could as well ban ES in the first place.


grand final, AEON.ru vs DmZ
replay page: [download] (6.64, 1.24)
comment: What makes this replay interesting is the way AEON.ru approach the game - they aimed for total AOE domination with the pick of Warlock, ES and Lich. I could say that it's hard for DmZ to realize this until the final pick of Lich, considering Mirana, Slardar, Warlock and ES are among the standard ganking/push heroes. DmZ mostly dominate small skirmish and ganks, however they simply cannot cope with AEON in large teamfight - Warlock Ulti and Bond, ES blink in, Ulti to clear creep, followed by Lich's Ulti. The replay itself is amazing to watch.

The Stories So Far...

exam times

After Plant Molecular Biology final exam this morning, today marks my penultimate day in my undergraduate year in Bachelor of Science (Biotechnology) at University of Adelaide, South Australia. The final day would come in 9 days time, the 2nd and last paper for my degree, Biotechnology Practice III. In the mean time, my application to for MARA sponsorship extension for my Honours next year is still ongoing. Should it succeed, I'll be staying for at least another year in Aussie. Although Honours could be one hell of a year, at least I could still enjoy the internet connection for another year :3

Would I go back to Malaysia by the end of the year? TBH I really want to go back if possible, because on 27th Nov there's a massive dota tournament held in Malacca (SGNDT Grand Final), plus it has been 2 years since I last place my step on my hometown soil. But thinking about the Honours and graduation next year, it seems like at least I'll be staying here until April (graduation), or at most until the end of 2010 (Honours).




Since there's quite a gap between my exam papers, I guess I could take a break or two to enjoy Magna Carta 2

Extra:
some more stuffs

went to Moonta Bay a few weeks ago due to someone's invitation, mainly to see the great scenery of the dusk's sky on the horizon. The sight of sun setting is a beauty to behold, as seen from those who went to the same place last year.'

wow...


Unfortunately, luck was not on our side this year, as come sunset the tide doesn't rise as much as last year (in fact I could say it didn't rise at all), and hence the sunlight wasn't reflected to produce similar scenery as seen above..


ffffuuuuu

Meanwhile, some sort of unusual pattern was observed on the shore. I would have said it was caused by shells/algae drifted and washed ashore, but this pattern was observed all over the place it's difficult to come out with proper reasoning.


sign of alien attack...not




Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Umineko compilation Part 2 - Umineko Motion Graphics



Shinryou Etsuko - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.1
Tracklist:
  • 01 -maboroshi no chou
  • 02 - imaginary waltz
  • 03 - aragaishimono
  • 04 - maboroshi no chou(instrumental)
  • 05 - imaginary waltz (instrumental)
  • 06 - aragaishimono (instrumental)
Download - [Umineko Motion Graphic Vol.1]


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Shinryou Etsuko - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.2
Tracklist:
  • 01 - meikoku kusari
  • 02 -tatta hitotsu dake
  • 03 - shinnen no tomoshibi
  • 04 - meikoku kusari (instrumental)
  • 05 - tatta hitotsu dake (instrumental)
  • 06 - shinnen no tomoshibi (instrumental)
Download - [Umineko Motion Graphic Vol.2]


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Shinryou Etsuko - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.3
Tracklist:
  • 01 - ambivalent
  • 02 - waga koe yo hikari tonari te hibike
  • 03 - sora ni, hashiru
  • 04 - ambivalent (instrumental)
  • 05 - waga koe yo hikari tonari te hibike (instrumental)
  • 06 -sora ni, hashiru (instrumental)

Download - [Umineko Motion Graphic Vol.3]


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Shinryou Etsuko - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.4

Tracklist:
  • 01 - kono ai o tsugu
  • 02 - 惜日
  • 03 - sacred promise
  • 04 - kono ai o tsugu (instrumental)
  • 05 - 惜日 (instrumental)
  • 06 - sacred promise (instrumental)
Download - [Umineko Motion Graphic Vol.4]


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Shinryou Etsuko - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.5

Tracklist:
  • 01 - intro
  • 02 - maboroshi no chou
  • 03 - imaginary waltz
  • 04 - aragaishimono
  • 05 - meikoku kusari
  • 06 - tatta hitotsu dake
  • 07 -shinnen no tomoshibi
  • 08 - ambivalent
  • 09 - waga koe yo hikari tonari te todoke
  • 10 - sora ni, hashiru
  • 11 - kono ai o tsugu
  • 12 - 惜日
  • 13 - sacred promise
  • 14 - meguri yuku toki
  • 15 - rakuen -fantasm-
  • 16 - ono ai o tsugu arrange mix ver
  • 17 - outro

Download - [Umineko Motion Graphic Vol.5]


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comments - For those who like Umineko Motion Graphic and the nice songs used, then these singles are a must. Or if you want to save download quota/time, just download volume 5 as it contains every other songs in previous UMG, except the instrumentals.
The torrent was upped on Nyaatorrents for quite awhile and consist of virtually EVERYTHING related to Umineko's music and sounds, thanks to Eicchi for reminding me about the torrent. I never actually thought that things like Shirabe, Discode and even this Umineko Motion has their own single lawl (I have all the song before, but not the singles).
Will upload others later.


Related posts:
RD - Umineko no Naku Koro ni compilation
RD - Shikata Akiko - Katayoku no Tori [Umineko OP]
RD - Umineko Motion Graphic vol.1
RD - Umineko no Naku Koro ni Character Song CD Vol.1 - Jessica & Maria


Monday, November 02, 2009

A Certain Railgun OP - Only My Railgun (Fripside)



Title: To Aru Kagaku no Railgun OP single - Only My Railgun

Artist: Fripside


tracklist:
01 only my railgun
02 late in autumn
03 only my railgun -instrumental-
04 late in autumn -instrumental-


direct download: [Megaupload (LonE release)]

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Finally it's out, one of my favorite fall song. The other song, Late in Autumn is not bad either, but I definitely rate Only My Railgun much higher. I remember the fake full version was released a bout 2 or 3 weeks ago (its as crappy as K-ON's ED fake full version), and a few days ago the actual leaked full version of the song was upped on TT. And finally today the full single was released :D

preview - Star Ocean 4 International








An international version of Star Ocean 4: The Last Hope has been announced by Square Enix for a worldwide PlayStation 3-exclusive release on February 9, 2010. Officially known as Star Ocean: The Last Hope International, the game will contain both Japanese and English voices as well as new content that will be exclusive to the international version of the game.


For PS3. Finally Square Enix (no, it's not Tri-Ace's fault right) decided to bring another former XBOX360-exclusive JRPG into PS3. They should have realize that jrpg fanbase is minimal for 360 and more in playstation. Vesperia has gone to PS3, so the only jrpg on 360 that I think worth its value is Infinite Undiscovery.

Nevertheless, having played the game on 360, I am still looking forward to Star Ocean 4 international. I don't expect much change in gameplay (it's already superb in 360 except a few areas like manual targeting), but I fucking hope that they FIX/CHANGE the English seiyuus, especially for Lym and Sarah. They're shit terrible. On and another thing, please remove the need to change disc when we travel to other planets later in the game, it's such a pain in the ass changing from disc 2 and 3, back and forth when doing the late quests (Gabriel Celeste and Ethereal Queen's Challenge, and normal quests). Well I suppose blu-ray effectively eliminate this problem, eh :3

related articles:
RD's Star Ocean 4 review
RD's SO4 Gameplay Insight - Blindside

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Winter 09/10 Anime List





*List is not complete and subject to changes.

sauce - various

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This winter (or summer for me) might be another free time for me, or not depending on my Honours Degree application. Nevertheless for this winter, series that I'm looking forward to and almost certainly, definitely went into my watchlist are Ookamikakushi, Durarara (from the creator of Baccano!), Vampire Bund, and Seikon Qwaser (lmao "milk" power - the manga was quite nice).
Then there's OVA too. There's OVA's like Utawa and Aika Zero that I've been waiting for. And especially, Denpateki na Kanojo vol 2!!! :DD Need more batshit girl :3

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Preview - End of Eternity/Resonance of Fate





Resonance of Fate, known in Japan as End of Eternity (エンド オブ エタニティ), is an upcoming console role-playing game developed by tri-Ace and published by Sega for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Its release date is currently set for January 28 2010 in Japan, and sometime in 2010 in North American and European markets.


End of Eternity on Wikipedia
End of Eternity@Sega Official

The gameplay video, along with 2 teaser videos were shown during recent Tokyo Game Show. My first impression on the video - wow, fukken awesome. The graphic, I mean. I can't comment much about the gameplay unless I tested it myself, but from the look of it, the gameplay seems to share a lot of similarity with recent Playstation 3/Xbox360 game, WET. The stylish use of gun to fight acrobatically rather than conventional sword/lance/magic etc seems enticing, and added to that is WET/Matrix-like slow-mo element which allows player to move swiftly while shooting.
The gameplay looks cool enough, as Tri-Ace fan, this game is a must for me. I just hope the aiming system and camera angle are easy to control. Can't wait for next year's release :D

The gameplay and Trailer can be downloaded here
TGS Trailer #1
TGS Trailer #2
TGS Gameplay
(credit to Gekkostate)

ps: End "fo" Eternity lulz