#this sonic pic is from one of the covers for issue 3 i believe

[wereh0gz]

Hits him with my boricua beam

[aj-the-idiot]

Soo , how many ocs do you have?

OH MY GOD I FORGOT ABOUT THIS D:

Here's all of them! (And a box to cover up an unrelated drawing)

More details and closer photos under the cut!

Perish, my beloved grumpy bastard. He's an Error/Nightmare child. He's short-tempered and might come off as rude. At his core he's a very curious and determined monster. His birthday is 25 October (2018)

Felony, who is a Lust/Killer child. He is a bit of a dare-devil and very passionate and caring about those he cares about. Technically, he is a yandere but I always forget to do something with it lmao. (If you look at the photo over the cut, you can see him looking at Perish!) He wears his heart on his sleeve and has no issue speaking his mind. His birthday is 7 November (2018)

Chalk, who is a self-proclaimed Cross/Ink child (he is a fusion of their magic and what the creator of his AU did with it). He is a bit of a scatterbrain and loves to see people be passionate. At times it seems like he cannot shut up if his life depended on it. He can get incredibly protective over those he cares about. His birthday is 1 February (2019)

Azul, who is a Swap/Ink child. He is sweet and caring and is seemingly very naive, believing that there is something good in everyone. He is very eager to help and speaks a lot. He is Felony's latest ex. (If you look at the photo over the cut, you can see him looking at Felony) His birthday is 2 April (2019)

Light, who is a Silvaze child. She one of the few things I have left from my time in the Sonic fandom (not really lol). She was supposed to be really similar to Maria and parts of Mephelis were in her soul, waiting to be released and manipulating her in her head. I created her August 2016.

Darka, my first ever OC (As may be evident by her name. In my defense, I was just starting to learn English). She was an overpowered vampire and one of two beings to keep the balance between negativity and positivity. (no wonder I'm this drawn to Dreamtale) Her counterpart turned out to be a child and she couldn't kill him even though it was prophesized. For some reason it "never felt right to give her a boyfriend." (Guess why, younger me. You created her after seeing Marceline from Adventure Time once) I created her some time in 2015.

And my background characters. The first one is how I would personally draw an anon, then two of Felony's friends, some merchants, Elian, a character @canyougimmecoffeethx and I never really did much with and lastly Mr. Woodpecker (he's a pigeon) who is a teacher togehter with Charlie and Tobias. They wouldn't fit but you can see them on the other pic anyways.

If you want to see more of my background characters you can see some old art here and here!

If you made it this far into the post, thank you so much!! <3

[vapormaison]

2019 Best Press 3/4:  カタカナ・タイトル + Kanji Title by TANUKI

While for many vaporwave vinyl is doubtless equal parts collector’s item and audio source, I don’t want to lose sight of the goal of this blog here: developing a canon of the genre for high fidelity enjoyment. That said, when I come across something remarkable or noteworthy about a particular piece of wax, even if it is not a “purely audiophile” object, I want to make mention of it.

And TANUKI’s カタカナ・タイトル + Kanji Title wax release is not only noteworthy, but contends for hi-fi consideration despite it’s status as a picture disc.

But let’s back up slightly.

Going back to the previous thesis on why we buy records, sometimes you just want to own a vinyl just because. Just because you’re a collector trying to compile a discography on wax — or, better yet, just because you truly love the album art. For me, カタカナ・タイトル + Kanji Title (Double EP) was undoubtedly all of the three “just be-causes”.

A while back, I noticed that the LP was going into its 3rd press, and decided to snap up a copy because I like Tanuki, I like Lum, and because of those other just becauses. Unfortunately the only format available was not the pink vinyl, but the picture disc. As I’m sure is well-known (because audiophiles are very loud about things they dislike), picture-discs are a big no-no in the audiophile community. This is because while a beautiful objet d’art, a serious listening session of a picture disc release will usually produce greater amounts of surface noise than any other type of vinyl. You can, of course, with the right system, neutralize and mitigate this process slightly, but true-blue hi-fi heads pursuing that elusive muse of “pure sound” would never give a picture disc a second look.

I’m not one of those people.

Tangentially, I’ve heard whispers of ghosts of rumors from when I was living in Shenzen, China — that various record suppliers (small batch Makers) are working out manufacturing and material processes that minimize these issues on pic discs to create appealing records that cover all the bases: hi-fi suitability, collector oriented visual esoterica, and price. I should also admit I have no idea where those companies are in terms of R&D and/or producing these. I end up catching a lot of very fast talk from extremely motivated enthusiasts, but Chinese is still as elusive a language to me at times as “pure sound” can be. With that in mind, however, it’s logical to surmise that advances in technology will eventually render the differences between picture discs and traditional black wax undistinguishable. So long as the world isn’t destroyed in some cataclysmic climate disaster (very real possibility), or -- as we are watching evolve now: World War 3. My view is that it’d be pointless to dismiss the format out of hand when there are active attempts to innovate it as we speak.

That all said, I know what to expect when a contemporary, big-label picture disc plays. During my college days, I used to spin wax at the university radio station. One of the previous catalog managers had a fetish for this “collectible” format, and was convinced he was doing the station a favor by purchasing all these vinyls, noting a pre-supposed resale value later. I remember throwing these on the well-worn Technics SP-10 we had as our main turntable, and listening to the occasional scratch, frequent popping, and constant surface noise, that for the uninitiated (bless you), sounds like a sustained “cracking” in your Rice Krispies — or for those born in the analog age, CRTV static.

So when I sat down with the Tanuki picture disc, I had this laundry list of preconceptions and prejudices about the format. I thought that I could listen to a moderately scratchy record once or twice, keep it as more a visual boutique item and then eventually include in an article where I bemoan the poor quality of the genre’s releases.

But then, I actually listened.

And it sounded… well, I won’t get ahead of myself. Here’s the full review:

THE MUSIC

BABYBABYの夢 — is doubtless the reason why many of us have bought the EP from a sonic perspective —especially if the band-camp reviews are indicative of trends. I still maintain that this is the Mariya Takeuchi sample/remix work par excellence. Tanuki hits all the essential notes here, a genuine respect and love for the sound-staging of its original source, Yume No Tsuzuki. I still get echoes of the original arrangement in my system, (ever so slightly) with a bright and dance-infused collection of unique sounds — particularly in that delicious, wide mid-range — that flesh out the track into its own sort of masterpiece.

何がGoin' On — the curatorial and conspiratorial side of my brain tells me that Goin’ On will probably go down as one the under-appreciated vintage bangers of this era of future funk. I can envision hipsters two or three decades from now sussing out a neophyte with pretentious questions about this track’s pitch-shifted sample draws from. It has that sort of vibe that you know hits with a certain subset of electronica fans — rich & vibrant, making the tweeters on your system work out in all the best ways — it’s just great.

がんばれ — Tanuki is at his best when he gets playful with brass samples. I firmly believe that the titans in this genre each have their go-to piece in their best arrangement — like Dan Mason’s creative vocal array, or greyL’s manipulation of micro-samples. For Tanuki, it’s whenever her gets a horn — synthesized or otherwise, into his production workflow.

ファンクOFF — continues Tanuki’s magic act, taking another city pop track more iconic for its soulful electric guitar riff and turning it into the most slap-worthy single on this EP. I prefer it when Japanese pop samples are fundamentally re-imagined, although I can see how the perfectionist tweaking of someone like Yung Bae is more appealing for some. Tanuki is undoubtedly one of the innovators of this genre, and there’s no more solid evidence of that talent than this track.

腕の中でDancin’ — if I ended up hosting a sort of mythical vaporwave grammies or something like that, (I’m available, folks!) I would probably go off on a Ricky Gervais style rant on how artists aren’t in touch with “the people” (read: me) because all we really want are more remixes of Meiko Nakahara songs — who given her impact on City Pop should have way more play in this genre than she does. This one, like most of the Meiko mixes I’ve heard, is a banger with an absolute fire bass riff punctuated throughout.

Radiant Memories — this might be my first certified “hot take” in the publication (they’ll be many more, I imagine) — but as far as I’m concerned this is the superior Plastic Love edit. I’ll just leave my thoughts there, so they can soak in with a portion of the fanbase who split my reddit account on an open fire of downvotes for suggesting that other artists than Macross 82-99 (Praise be upon him!) are allowed to touch this song as well. While Macross’s mix is definitely the more up-temo of the two, and that for some is the very essence of the genre, this slightly down-mixed version is both the perfect conclusion for the EP and ideal antithesis.

THE LISTENING EXPERIENCE

Signal to Raise ratio on the following albums:

カタカナ・タイトル + Kanji Title:  ~61.9db (1 db MoE)

Tron Legacy, Daft Punk:  58.4db

Love Trip, Takako Mamiya, Kitty Records Press: 65.8db

(ratings based on averages 5 minutes of sustained play on the testing unit, the machine actually complied this data on its preset, which is another fascinating part about this sort of vintage press-testing tech). The margin of error is because the machine, according to my mentor Dr. Juuso Ottala formerly of Harman International, informs me it was never meant to give accurate readings of picture discs, and to add about a dB of error margin.

One of the benefits of growing up in New England and, subsequently, New York, is that there are no shortage of heritage professional audio brand HQs in operation around a 200 mile radius from Manhattan to Boston. Off the top of my head, there’s Harman/Kardon, Boston Acoustics, Bose, NuMark, Marantz, and Rane headquarters within an hour’s drive from my two hometowns. Early on in my audiophile quest, I got my hands on some cool vintage gear — vinyl lathe testing equipment that has collected dust in both an old Harman technician’s storage unit, and now my parent’s basement. Over the holiday, I recently brought it out to do some surface noise testing on it to get a rough confirmation of what I was explaining in yesterday’s hi-fi guide. The innards of the machine looks eerily like a plinth-less linear tonearm and plate pair attached to a monitor. After making sure I’m not violating some kind of Harman International trade secret, I’ll post it on instagram.

Wanting to also get a firm idea on just how good my ear-test sounded, I grabbed another picture disc vinyl I had received as a gift a few years ago from my brother — the Tron Legacy OST. While I found the film passably enjoyable, my own preconceptions about pic discs, and a general exhaustion with french house — left me with no discernible desire to spin the thing. I hadn’t even broken the seal on the plastic wrap, so it seemed like as good as a blind test as any. I also grabbed what my ears tell me is a “good”, “heavy” press, a 1982 original dead-stock copy of Takako Mamiya’s Love Trip LP pressed by Kitty Records Japan. I’ve played it maybe a half dozen times since I bought it, so it’s as close to “new” 80s audiophile pop record as you can get. The Japanese are infamously anal about low SNR on their vinyl.

And, well, the results speak for themselves. The sweet spot for most black vinyl records is between 60-70db depending on age, weight, and a host of other frankly uncontrollable factors that aren’t worth getting into detail here, as I’d go on forever. The main takeaway here is that Neoncity’s and Tanuki’s record sat at the low end of the audiophile vinyl reference spectrum. Which in itself is a remarkable achievement for a pic disc. It’s worth taking a look at Tron Legacy, which just barely scratches 8db above a cassette tape, and 7db a Japanese vinyl from 1982.

This is all in an effort to say: damn, this is pretty good.

This also somewhat counters the usual “picture discs sound like shit” narrative that’s prevailed pretty consistently in the audiophile community. Tron Legacy? Yeah, that probably sounds like shit if I could bother to suffer through a listen. But whoever Hong-Kong based Neoncity is using actually makes “good” — if such a qualifier needs to be attached — image-pressed records. And that devotion to audio fidelity should be rewarded.

It might be time for me to re-asses picture discs on the whole, and that mind-expanding moment is something I owe to the fine folks at Neoncity.

[justheretotalkaboutgames]

Atlantis Squarepantis (Wii)

Basic Premise

“ In SpongeBob's Atlantis SquarePantis, SpongeBob and Patrick stumble upon the lost magical amulet that will take them to the legendary city of Atlantis. Players will join them and the rest of their Bikini Bottom pals as they ride in a magical bus for a soaking new adventure. Hoping to uncover the treasures of Atlantis in order to fulfill SpongeBob's dream of finding the "World's Oldest Bubble," players will control whether the city brings everything he desires, or if Plankton's evil plan will burst his bubble. [THQ] “ -Metacritic

Basically in this game you relive the events of the pretty meh episode special through 4 types of minigames while you can also do some stuff on the side. 

The Looks

One of these is from the game and the other one with from the 2002 Employee of the Month PC game. 

My point for bringing these up is because the cutscenes look really...weird to me. You go from the nice-looking in-game models to these odd-looking cutscenes. 

Besides the cutscenes (And tutorial-bob) the models and game look appealing. During some of the game’s sections, you notice a couple of cute visual details like Patrick accidentally throwing his icecream in the air to wave at SpongeBob and said icecream falls onto his head and during Squidward’s posing you see all the silly looking posing and finished paintings.

Audio-wise it shares a similar issue to Creature of the Krusty Krab. In Battle for Bikini Bottom, the lines were short and sweet or at least easy to ignore. in this game the characters have a tendency to use the same line a LOT and some are long. The only sessions that didn’t bug me were the puzzle sections and sections Plankton’s/Squidward's Posing scenes. 

There was one really weird part of the game though to me.

Mr.Krabs voice I guess wasn’t hired because Mr. Krabs says absolutely nothing cept weird noises and laughs. Characters will act as if they’re gonna have a conversation with Mr. Krabs and all he does is stand there

like a dead

sou͟ll͢e҉ss̡

H̴̷́͜͡Ứ͝S̴̢̀͞K̢̕͡

Oh, also before each gameplay you have an always smiling weird looking model of Spongebob. You can customize his outfit by buying stuff in the shop 

The Gameplay

The gameplay can be separated into multiple sections

Those sections i’m gonna explain

Pressing a button at right time sections

Driving an Ice Cream Tank sections

Puzzle sections

On Rail Sections

Misc.

Pressing a button at the right time sections

My least favorite part was the longest and most frequent ones, oh joy.

They’re titled as ‘musical’ bits but I don’t really call them that because their music for the scenes you never know when they end because they just repeat the track. Really there’s only ONE ‘musical’ part and it’s at the beginning when everyone is powering up the bus with their own form of music

(btw in said part Patrick is last, finishes his part, then in the cutscene says he wants to try)

Usually in these parts you get up to 3 characters to run as, if you mess up the character disappears till the section is over. A.K.A, you have three chances to beat the section. Which, least to me, wasn’t TOO difficult. At most I lost like, 2 characters.  

Driving an Ice Cream Tank sections

In these sections you play as plankton, destroying stuff and advancing to destroy more stuff. Occasionally you get a powerup that I THINK lets you shoot faster.

While these sections can be fun, story-wise they make very little sense. You destroy buildings, tanks, and all sorts of stuff with ice cream. Your literal temporary powerup is a CONTAINER OF FROZEN ICECREAM. So the fact plankton is shocked at the end it’s ice cream is a little ridiculous. 

Controlling the tanks with the d pad (it says on the back cover to use nunchucks- in the main parts of the game at least you never use them) is uncomfortable and stiff. I would’ve rather been able to use the smooth and simple nunchuck here. 

Puzzle Sections

...My only favorite parts were like, what, two stages?

The first time you use it is near the start with SpongeBob and Patrick trying to exit the cave. Spongebob can use a spatula to open doors for himself and flip canons while Patrick can throw Spongebob/Anchors to get to areas. 

The second time you get 3 more characters. Sandy lassos (you swing the wii remote in a circle to lasso) characters towards her and opens up hatches which create bridges. Squidward runs fast (he’s sonic now I guess) so he can pass through treadmills other characters can and uses treadmills to open doors. Mr Krab’s pockets can magnetically go in the direction of money, letting him go to far areas. 

You only use these mechanics twice

t w i c e 

The banter I found it easier to ignore here and when I was paying attention, wasn’t annoying me. I thought the guards in the second portion in the light rooms were charming. 

On Rail Sections

There are three variations of the on rail parts.

You either play in a museum (one at bikini bottom and another at Atlantis) and take photos while throwing Krabby patties at guards who are trying to stop you and make you lose points. You usually wanna take pictures of artifacts, usually indicated by a Spongebob hand pointing at it. I found it odd we threw Krabby patties at Atlantian guards because all these parts were BEFORE Patrick popped the bubble.

And speaking of that part, you DO reach that bubble. You don’t actually pop it though like the cutscenes later will claim. You take a pic and for a few minutes, you can clearly see it’s still standing there. 

One other part, that only happens once, is Sandy and Mr. Krabs (though he shows no indication he’s actually wanting Sandy to help). teaming up to collect as many riches as possible. You do this by shooting multiple pieces of treasure and jewelry- some more valuable than others. If you gain three gems in a row you get a combo and sometimes even a powerup. Don’t shoot anvils or taxes or else you lose points. These parts were alright, though felt like they took a while. 

The third variant is with, again, Sandy. She’s shooting ping pong balls out of Squidward (don’t ask) to attack enemies and continue your escape out of Atlantis because they’re pretty pissed about Patrick popping the real bubble. You can destroy certain obstacles and soldiers holding icecream also for bonus points.

Each of these parts were alright, nothing special though that i’d want to come back to.

Misc.

There’s things you can do in-between stages.

You see, if you complete a stage under certain limits/time you get medals. You can continue the stages I believe without them, but in order to buy anything, you need to get a medal.

Gold: 3

Silver: 2

Bronze: 1

I usually got silvers and I was not motivated to try to do gold for each part. I only didn’t get a medal piece once at the end with plankton. 

In the shop, you can either buy accessories for tutorial-bob, gain look at concept art, and minigames. 

They, in my opinion, aren’t worth getting a bunch of gold medals over. The minigames are average and even sometimes flawed and you only see tutorial bob in pre-level explaining

In Conclusion

When I first played the game I hoped it was gonna be like Truth or Square, where the game was waaaay better than the actual show special. I knew the game was also made by Spongebob creature from a Krusty krab which- while not perfect- the game still obtained a certain charm to it. This game wasn’t terrible per se, but it was just boring and felt like a large waste of my time. I want to think the creators still tried with this one due to all the visual quirks in the in-game sections. This one though just wasn’t a hit for me. 

I remember when I was young and I first played it I hated it too much to put it in areas where it could easily be destroyed (It still work on my wii u though). While I, of course, would not do that today I can see why I didn’t like it much back then. Especially when compared to the other ones.