Toradora! Episode 18

The latest episode of Toradora is out, well to be accurate, it was out a few days ago, I just didn't post about it rofl. Anyway, I found it to be a pretty entertaining episode. It starts off normally, with the class preparing for the christmas party. Winter Tests are comming up so the students are also studying for that.

Ami gets some "alone" time with Ryuji, and it turns into her saying he has a father-daughter relationship. Which is what it seemed like their relationship was from the start, though we know that's not how it's going to stay.

Well, tests end, and as you can see, Haruta becomes extremely happy, have you ever seen someone get that elated for the ending of tests??

Young Taiga seeing "Santa" in her dream. She was so cute!

Ryuji discovers Taiga's treasure trove of presents, and asks why she is sending gifts to her family. However, Ryuji, being Ryuji, helps her bring them to the post office. On the way there she then goes into a story of why she loves Christmas. The reasoning being "Even if you don't have parents or believe in god, there is someone watching over you" and that everywhere is beautiful and dazzling.

That's Santa's little helper: Taiga!

Now that tests are over, the class starts to concentrate on the upcoming party. Everyone begins to work hard, and Ami gets to borrow a fake tree that was used in one of her old photo shoots. Taiga brings her favorite Christmas ornament: a glass star for the top of the tree.

Shortly after they finish constructing the tree a ball comes crashing through the window, knocking it down, shattering Taiga's beloved Star. Minorin comes in shortly after to see the tree destroyed and Taiga's star in peices.

Minorin attempts to fix Taiga's star with little success

The episode ends with Minorin and Ryuji talking about the party and with Ryuji trying to convince he Minorin to come to the party, telling her he will wait for her to come. And her saying she won't go so he shouldn't wait, pretty cliche stuff.

"I'll wait for you"

Overall, a decent episode with some comedy and drama, it was pretty casual and fun until Minorin comes in and destroys the tree. Then it gets pretty emo, but I still enjoyed the episode. I am really interested to see how it will devolp between the three main female characters and Ryuji, especially Minorin and Ami, I really like their characters.

Jump! Ultimate Stars

Now, you may have heard of Shounen Jump, a Japanese magazine which serializes several very well known titles, namely: Naruto, Bleach, Dragonball Z and One Piece. However, you may not have heard of this game. It is a platform fighter, and is called the "Super Smash Brothers of the DS". It is a very addicting game, which you will probably find yourself constantly returning to (or at least I have lol). The game is rather simple, there are 3 types of "koma": Battle, Support and Help. Battle koma (4-8 square) are the koma which one uses to fight with, you can have up to four of them in a single deck, supports (2-3 squares) are koma that come out and help you combo, and helps (1 square) are koma that give you passive effects to your battle character. You need all 3 to create a playable deck, meaning you need at least 1 battle, 1 support, and one help. As you play through the game, you gather several different types of gems, which is the currency in the game used to upgrade and evolve your komas, giving you a wide array of options for deck creation. To the right is a sample deck, and is one of the decks I use regularly when playing. Just an FYI I usually play supportless so I just throw in some random support koma...

So, you can play as your favorite characters, beat up ones that you just dispise, and perhaps gain a few new animes or mangas to watch, what could make this game even better? Thats right, it has wifi, and if you ask me, this is what makes the game. Gathering and upgrading koma is fun and interesting and all, but it gets very tedious after a few hours. Playing wifi always changes and is incredibly fun. My favorite place to go for games is the Gamefaqs forums there are a lot of cool people there that will help you out and if you're like me, you may find yourself just going there for fun. Here is a sample video, recorded by TrueNinjaTactics (RandomCitizen) of 2 visiters of the Gfaqs forums, for a little taste of the game.


There are also several other types of videos on youtube if you search, here is a combo video that I made a few months ago
It's not the greatest ever, but then again, I'm not exactly a pro at this game :(.


But this game isn't perfect, the AI in the game is just HORRIBLE, there is no exaggeration there. Computers literally kill themselves every once in a while. The story mode can become tedious and boring, it is fun at first, but as you go through the same style of missions for a large amount of worlds, you'll find yourself getting bored very quickly.

So to sum it up: Great game, if you have Wifi, if you don't have access to wifi, I would steer clear of this game, it's a nice game to play even with out wifi, but you'll find it's not worth the money speant, especially since you would have to pay more since it is an import game, and since it is an import game, most of it is in Japanese, however, Genroh kindly took the time to write up a very informative FAQ, which can be used to complete the missions.

Welcome!

Hey guys and gals, welcome to my blog, you can call me Frodo or Moop, it doesn't really matter, since most people call me by both :). Anyway, this site will be mostly me blogging about my two favorite things at the moment, anime and games. I'll also probably do some occasional blogs about other tv shows and what not, but for the most part, it'll be about current anime/manga and games I am playing. Thanks for viewing my page, and hope to see you again!