Subterranean Animism crashes

Subterranean Animism has been crashing intermittently. It's only interrupted one game so far, but its still a worrisome trend as it may mean memory is leaking or that it is possible for people to write viruses into replay files.

This particular crash occurred when I tried to save a reply of a perfect stage 2 run on hard.

[gg]: "we didn't actually drop Geass lol"

YHBT

Meh same difference. Either way no one gives a shit and [gg] bumps themselves down a tier. In fact dramawhoring is a worse infraction than dropping shows imo.

I mean I've enjoyed the other hijinks [gg] has pulled, but this wasn't funny. Well maybe it would have been if I was on /a/ at the time, who knows.

So much hate

The only possible explanation is that the Xam'd rippers and encoders are trying to fail as hard as possible.

Furries = terrorists

So now that Birdy Decode has stopped having subber issues, I've picked it up again. I've been watching [EMiNA]'s subs because the quality seems good and they have been releasing somewhat consistently. Also from what I've heard on #/a/ [AoShen] has serious TL and QC problems.

Encoding

Xam'd is hardsubbed by Funimation and for some reason the US release is two months earlier than the Japan release. This means we won't get archive worth softsubs until September.

Now up until now I've been watching PlaySonPS3's rip/encode, which is good in my opinion. However PlaySonPS3 is dropping Xam'd, and the reigning high def encode seems to be Fabulous. Fabulous has been releasing consistently and fast, and is offered on `Waryas's bots. Unencoded .ts files are also available under the name somedouches. Here's a comparison of the various offerings.



Now its apparent, to me at least, that the words on the Fabulous encode are slightly blurry and hard on the eyes. It bothers me enough that I'm thinking of trying my hand at encoding. Also there's no reason to use mkv over mp4 if you're not going to make use of any of mkv's unique features, and Fabulous is unnecessarily making it harder for people to play their files in OSX by using that container.

[gg] drops Code Geass

It doesn't get much clearer than that. We are not subbing it any more, and will not pick it back up no matter how much you fags bitch or whine. We are doing this for a number of reasons, most of which involve us getting tired of the series and everything about it. It is shit. It wasn't good for anything but trainwreck value to begin with, but it's taken that too far recently and we no longer want to have our name associated with it to the point of preferring to be labelled as a group that drops shows. Also, we're tired of the retarded fanbase.

They have a point, but this bumps [gg] down a tier (from god/high to high/mid). They dropped Geass in the middle first season, they dropped Geass in the middle second season, how can I know they won't drop more shows?

Also picking up Macross mid season was bad form, but I don't care so much since I dropped Macross before the fansubber drama started to pick up.

Xam'd first impression

So far Xam'd seems like a really good series with an great setting and a lot of interesting plot. Kaiba was also a really good series with a great setting and a lot of interesting plot, but the plot was too much for the creators and the season finale fucked everything over. Also both Xam'd and Kaiba have an awesome English OP and ED, which only furthers my fears.

This is a trend in anime that began with Evangelion and continues to this day with anime such as Noein. The only reason I persevere after being let down again and again is in the hope that one of these series might turn out like the Nausicaa manga.

Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu = dropped

I'm dropping Haruka. It's too over the top and too badly done for me. I guess I'll have to wait until the Lucky Star OVAs (which I am eagerly anticipating) to get another dose of otaku moe.

This means that Kyoura Kazoku Nikki and Code Geass are the only current shows I'm following. To fix this I shall begin watching Xam'd right after I finish typing this post.

4chan break

I've banned myself from 4chan by using Meru's tripcode to trigger an autoban. This is so I can focus on programming and playing games during the week between the end of summer classes and the start of fall classes. Once I get back to university I'll be at a different IP address and the ban won't apply.



Other reasons include wanting to sit out /a/ becoming /code geass/. Geass was oversaturating the board to a certain extent, but by giving /a/ and obnoxious header moot is just fagging up the board for no good reason. I hope he changes it back to animu and mango before school starts.

Subterranean Animism, stage 1

Stage 1 of Subterranean Animism is well designed, more so in my opinion than most of ZUN's stage 1s. The music gets off to a fast start, keeping with Mountain of Faith's style, but for the first time in a touhou game the danmaku also gets off to a fast start. This is especially true if you're playing on lunatic, where you'll find yourself dodging walls of blue death just seconds after the music begins.



Next there's some rocks and some faeries to blow up, and then we get to the stage 1 midboss, Kisume. Besides having good character design and being well drawn, bucket loli also has a really fun spellcard if you're playing on hard or lunatic. Horror "Well-bucket-dropping Monster" is easiest to capture unfocused and makes you move around a lot. Also the style makes it seem like Kisume is spinning upside down and pouring danmaku at you, which is really neat.



The later half of the level was frustratingly difficult on hard mode in the Subterranean Animism demo. If I tried to avoid bombing I could sometimes die two times, the stage was actually easier in lunatic mode. Thankfully it seems ZUN fixed thing in the full version and stage 1 now seems more like a stage 1.



The stage 1 spider loli boss is pretty standard fare, about as exciting as Wriggle and less exciting than Cirno. There is one attack that is unexpectedly intense and difficult if you're playing on lunatic though.



So far things don't seem that unusual in terms of danmaku, but I assure you craziness will come later.

New release!

Comiket happened in Japan and now Subterranean Animism is out. Torrent is here:
http://isohunt.com/torrent_details/49225095/Subterranean+Animism