Past News Archive: May 2008
May 27, 2008
Mail galore! Last week, I got my Lucky STAR Vol.1 LE & Kanon Vol. 4 DVDs. Yesterday, Nendoroid Miku Hatsune (finally!)& Shuraki Nida arrived. Then today, I brought Queen's Blade EX Shizuka from Sakura Media. By the end of the month, I'm going to be flood with more junk at my door. If not by the end of this week, it's going to be at the first week of June. I really need to clean my room now. Damn.
Last week, Good Smile Company offered an replacement exchange program to customers that have the Nendoroid Lucky Star Konata Izumi Lucky Star Web Page version. They are replacing the "dadada" finger due to the factory forgetting to put the swirling mark on it. Click here if you don't know what I mean & look at the pic from that site. Because I'm on this side of the world, I'm screwed. Anyways, I got the review of that item up as well as Good Smile Company Nendoroid #28c: Lucky Star Kagami Hirragi (Chara-Ami Ver.).
Other last updates for this month include in the collectables section are calendar reviews of 2005 Tenjho Tenge Calendar (Manga Version) & 2008 ARIA Calendar (Manga Version). Also, I finally got up in the gallery section is Hiiragi Hinata Photo Gallery 1. In the Artbooks & Illustration Books section, Ito Noizi Art Collection Gu-Ren-N is now up. Big updates for this month.
Speaking of photo galleries, I've been playing around a lot with different websites to find a good one. If any of you have a suggestion which to use that is free & unlimited, let me know. Although it's still a test market thing, I will continue it if I can find a suitable place to do it.
May 20, 2008
Been training a new front desk agent & she's pretty good as she managed to pick things up fairly quickly than I imagine. Also, I came back from a training seminar for Ramada. This came to me as a surprise last week just before I started my days off. I never nothing about it as I was told about it at the last moment. It was in Burnaby & I was joined by the two new front desk agents. Our GM tells us that he want to send his key members there. I can imagine me being one, but the newest members is strange; especially the one that got it on the first day of work. But I think he means us being full-time staff members there. Plus, we came in late. I thought we came in late due to traffic, but it was more. The seminar started at 8:30. Our GM told us 9.
In anime news, FUNimation is going license wild. They got Kenichi: The Mightiest Disciple & Gunslinger Girl II Teatrino. Kenichi will have two volumes released in 2009 while Gunslinger is said to be released in one complete DVD release in late 2009. Another title that the company picked up is Soukou no Strain. All 13 episodes will be sold as a single boxset in March 2009. It seems that FUNimation is really going for the DVD set approach. Cheaper, but extras will suffer if you are one of those diehard otakus. And another from that company is Shigurui: Death Frenzy with all 12 episodes to be released in 2009 as well. And another are D. Gray-Man & Romeo X Juliet. Again, all having 2009 releases. For D. Gray-Man, only the first season is licensed.
In the mail coming soon, I got Nida coming probably next week. I'll be very lucky if she comes at the end of this week. I expect it to come next week or the end of the month instead. Last week, I got my Pia Carrot!! 3 game guide book in the mail.
In other collection related news, there are several PSP games from Japan that has caught my eyes & it's major spending time again! Gundam Battle Universe, Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus, & Fate/Tiger Colosseum Upper (the LE edition of course). All coming in the summer. Bleach: Heat the Soul 5 is on my list too. Haven't got anything from that series since the first installment. Planned to get another one somewhere down the line, but didn't know when. Heard that it isn't as good as the fourth one. Decided to get this than wait for the sixth installment since it's going to be awhile. That is if the filler episodes from the anime gets finished in a fast pace. Plus, I recently got God of War: Chains of Olympus at $19.99 plus taxes at Future Shop last week. Good price for a short game that I have been eyeing on for a long time. Anyways, I still have stacks of PSP games not yet touched or done. Still working on Crisis Core as I'm mainly leveling up my materia & levels using the "leave your PSP on" method. I think I'm almost at the end, but spending too much time working on the missions to 100% which is going to be awhile.
Updates for this week are still minimal. Anime review of Koharu Biyori is up. For the Artbooks & Illustration Books section, Ito Noizi Art Collection Gu-Ren-N. For collectables, I dug out an review of FREEing Nendoroid Plus: SHUFFLE! Memories: Primula no Chittyana Daiboken!? Figurine (Normal Version). Speaking of that Nendoroid, I've got the collectable gallery going now. But I need to find a better free website to do this as the two I've found isn't as good as I thought.
Something else to watch out for, especially if you are Pia Carrot!! 3 fan, is the revamp Welcome to Pia Carrot!! 3 special section. Updates will come out of nowhere slowly & will have music automatically played in all pages in a low volume. The original source is ogg format & was very soft to begin with.
May 13, 2008
Got news that Shuraki PVC figurine Nida (originally Needa but her name changed) is being released this week. So I'll be getting her earlier than I thought. Probably get her next month still, depending how fast the mailing process is & if I'm one of the lucky ones getting it.
In other news, I discovered that the Jingai Makyo Didii figurine is delayed to the end of May. I was wondering why I didn't get any notice about the item being shipped to me. Took me some net surfing to find this information. Wished the seller informed me about this than having me wonder about it. From what I've seen, it doesn't look like many people are interested in this figurine as there is very little information about it. Me, I did actually have doubts on her because of the face & size not being 25cm or more. But I decided to get her since there is very little products of her.
In the mail last week, I got my Nendoroid Lucky Star figurines. Came very fast from Japan via EMS. Never had it done that fast before. I open my Konata Izumi first, but only out of the box. She isn't removed from the plastic casing yet. Was using for some photography testing.
I've been testing out this lighting tent that I made for photography & used Konata as my test subject. I tried using my Canon 40D, but it didn't work well. It's probably cause of the lens not designed for close range shooting which I do a lot in my collectable reviews. Then again, I don't think those type of cameras are meant to be used like that. My old Sony DSC-F828 did a better job for the lighting tent shots than the 40D & that camera is suppose to be superior one. Probably either need to change the lens with something used for close range or learn to use it properly. Then again, it's probably because my lighting tent isn't made properly since I didn't use the right materials for it. Used paper instead of fabric on some parts of it.
In anime news, FUNimation licensed Save me! Lolipop (aka Mamotte! Lollipop). They plan to release all 13 episodes into a single boxset by late 2008.
Updates for this week are Kimi ga Aruji de Shitsuji ga Ore de (They are my Noble Masters) & Yotsunoha. For the collectable side, reviews of Volks Customa-P CFP-04 Rozen Maiden Suigintou Figurine & Fraulein Revoltech Series 004 Pocco Action Figurine are up. Unfortunately, they are in the old review format. Newer reviews (meaning the ones that aren't stored in my HD for a long time & yet to be put up) will have some pics due with my lighting tent if size permits. Plus, I want to see if I can get a rotating base to allow people to see the figures in all angles in a video form. This way, people will see the figures better in a 360 form. I plan to redo all the reviews with this kind of video (provided that I still the items with me). Anyways, for Artbooks & Illustration Books, Alpha: Kozue Amano Illustration Works is up now.
As I about to put up the revised version of the Welcome to Pia Carrot!! 3 special section up until I discovered that the file storage site that I used to put the music in got changed. Apparently, they merged with another site & I lost all the files there. What's more use is that I only registered there about a week ago! So, I ended up making a new account there & re-uploaded my files & change the paths in the web pages. Pain in the ass! After this section, I want to see if I can to to planetarian next or get Welcome to Pia Carrot!! G.O. up. Problem with Pia G.O. is that I can't get the music out of the game. So it may not be fancy as Pia 3 as the game music was easy to get.
May 6, 2008
New month means archiving last month's news. You can find April 2008 entries in the Past News Archives section now.
As mentioned before, I'm currently awaiting for my special order items of my Jingai Makyo Didii PVC figurine & the Nendoroid Lucky Star Konata & Kagumi figurines. The Nendoroids are on their way. For Didii, don't know about that status. As long as I'm getting her, I'm fine. I think I won't be getting any of them until middle or the end of the month. I recently remembered that it's Golden Week at Japan, so it may take longer than usual. Gives me a chance to clean out my room a bit as my current new additions are flowing out of the closet. Still want that Queen's Blade Shizuka PVC figurine as well that came out last week. Man!
In anime news, Rightstuf has licensed all ARIA anime shows. This includes ARIA the ANIMATION, ARIA the NATURAL, ARIA the OVA ~Arietta~, & ARIA the ORIGINATION. That's heavy duty. I updated my reviews on these anime shows & OVA to reflect the licensing status. Doing some web surfing, I learned that Viz licensed the TV show of Hunter X Hunter. Personally, I thought this was licensed a long time ago. The biggest one that I found was Media Blasters getting Seirei no Moribito which was originally licensed by Geneon Entertainment USA. This is the first anime North American license that I've seen so far that is taken from Geneon after they stopped producing DVDs. However, Geneon is still holding licenses to other shows that are trapped & are actually still working on the productions of them.
Updates for the new month still consist of old anime reviews as new ones aren't much to give at the moment. They are true tears & Tsubasa Chronicles Tokyo Revelations. For the Artbooks & Illustration Books section, there's 4C: Katsura Masakazu Illustrations & Newtype 100% Collection #31: Parasite EVE up.
As for other stuff, I'm actually currently playing around with the site. As you can see on the right side of this home page, it's white now to prevent any the text here being read incorrectly. Still thinking what I'm going to do with that side. As for special sections, still working on them. Want to see if I can add music to them if I know how.