There is a question that always frustrates me a little when I’m asked. If something is wrong with me and I go see a doctor, I’m asked “On a scale of 1 to 10, how is your pain?” This is a very important question for doctors to ask but what bothers me about it is that it relies on the patients interpretation of their own pain. A pain of 5 for one patient could be a 3 to another patient. In that same way, I can sometimes feel that is applicable when it comes to scoring media. Scoring media is…
Category: 2019
If you have been reading this blog up to this point, you’ll know how much of a fan of Dark Souls I am. What you won’t know is that whenever I load up one of these games and enter the character creation, I always choose to create a female character. “Why do I do this?” I have wondered. The first thing to note is how few games feature females as the lead character. In particular it reminds me of something I heard about a game called “Life is Strange”. As the developer Dontnod was seeking out publishers, the thing they…
Crowdfunding is a method by which a large number of people invest a small to moderate amount of money (rarely a large amount of money can also be invested) in order to finance a project. It sounds as if it would be great as a way to finance the release and translation of manga but it is not quite as simple as it appears. I should begin by explaining my own experience with Kickstarter, one of the most popular crowdfunding platforms. As a fan of Osamu Tezuka, I have been collecting his manga for years and, prior to 2014, I…
I’m sure that, if you’re an anime fan, the thought of “How does anime actually make money?” has crossed your mind. It’s an understandable question. Starting with a fact that may surprise you, let’s take a look at a list of the TV ratings of animated TV series airing in Japan between October 21st and 27th 2019. If you examine this article, you’ll notice that, while some shows such as One Piece, Detective Conan and My Hero Academia are familiar to anime fans in the west, most of the shows on the list are unfamiliar to western fans. These mainstream…
As mentioned in “Why I’m a PC Gamer“, my only source of video games comes from the PC platform. However, my tastes tend to lean towards games of Japanese origin. Many people have, historically, questioned me on this, stating that not many Japanese games are released on PC. Here, I am going to explain the dramatic change in the world of Japanese games on PC and how it has got to this point. First off, it is worth noting that PC gaming wasn’t always unpopular in Japan. At one point, it was the most popular platform for playing RPGs. In…
If you’ve been collecting any manga recently, you are very likely to have bought an omnibus or two. For those of you who might be unfamiliar with the term, an omnibus is a single book “containing several books previously published separately.” Since so much of manga is now released in this format, I thought it might be worth discussing why manga is released like this and what to watch out for. The benefits of omnibuses for the consumer are rather easy to see. As mentioned in “The Joy of One-Shot Manga“, a common issue that people have with collecting manga…
As has been well-established in “Why I like Anime” and “Why I love Halloween again!“, I am a big fan of both Horror and Animation. It is a shame then how infrequent horror animation is. I know what you’re thinking “Immortallium, are you mad? There are tons of horror animated movies/shows.” However, hear me out. It is true that there are many animated movies and shows that dabble in horror. However, I think there is a big difference between dabbling in horror and embracing it. In the past when I have complained about the dearth of Horror Animation, people have…
I want to start by saying that I consider myself a feminist. I believe that women should have equal rights with men and that they should not have to suffer abuse whether physically or emotionally. Having said all this, I do find myself questioning my thoughts and opinions on how women are portrayed in media on a regular basis. None has created such debate in my head as “the Final Girl”. As I mentioned in my article “Why I love Halloween again!“, I adore horror films. However, a common trope of many horror films is that of a girl who,…
I think we all remember how much we loved Halloween as children. We would cosplay as our favourite characters and go house to house collecting sweets. However, as I grew up, I lost interest in this holiday as the appeal of dressing up and collecting sweets lost their appeal. However, I love Halloween again now for a completely different reason! It may surprise you but I adore horror! I love horror movies, books, video games etc. Back in secondary school (around the same time as the events of “Why I like Anime”), I heard of and saw a film called…
It should come as no surprise to you that I am a proponent for collecting physical media whether it be DVDs, Blu-rays, novels, manga etc. In an age where streaming services have rapidly grown and with the rise of eBooks, many people have questioned me on my preference for physical media. Allow me to explain. The first and most obvious answer is that I like to collect. While I can collect eBooks and digital film and TV shows, I feel a great satisfaction from having a physical collection that I can reliably pick up. Apple’s terms of service for iTunes…