腐男好介绍 - 《LOVE STAGE！！》

终于来到第二个腐男好介绍了！刻刻
这个星期要介绍的作品是耽美作品中有名的一部，那就是影木荣贵原著和藏王大志作画的《LOVE STAGE！！》
两位老师在耽美和百合界里算是有名堂的，而且之前也有合作过。

故事讲述泉水（いずみ），小时候被明星父母逼代替女花童和男花童龙马（りょうま）一起拍广告。
十年后，因为拍摄广告受创成了宅男的泉水，又再次被逼和已经成为名人，而且深深爱着当年女花童的龙马拍摄婚纱广告。
这样的姻缘把两个人套在了一起。

虽然目前只有25话，不过《LOVE STAGE！！》在去年的夏季（2014）被改编成动画，一共10集+1集OVA。
而且影木荣贵老师也有出番外小说《BACK STAGE！！》讲述泉水哥哥，圣湖和玲的故事，去年正式改编成漫画目前有2话。
受（濑名泉水）： 代永翼
攻（一条龙马）： 江口拓也
攻（濑名圣湖）： DAIGO
受（相乐玲）： 平川大辅

这里要说哦，DAIGO是影木老师的真实弟弟，而且圣湖一角也是DAIGO给予灵感的（搜搜看，就会看到对比照的啦!)。
由于是歌手不是声优，所以各位要原谅DAIGO的演出哦！（虽然一开始时我很想揍他，过后发现他原来现实说话也是那样的。。。）

《LOVE STAGE！！》目前在角川书店的「CIEL」杂志上连载，每两个月更新一次。

Game Weekend: Pokemon Shuffle

If you ever wanted a Candy Crush x Pokemon, look no further! Pokemon Shuffle is for you!

Pokemon Shuffle or ポケとる in Japan, is a Nintendo 3DS free to download game. It is a simple match 3 puzzle game and have 165 main stages, 20 expert stages and various special event stages added weekly (as of the writing of this post). Pokemons can be collected/captured and added to your selection against other new Pokemons. Mega-evolve Pokemons are also available in the game and have powerful attacks that clear the board. You get 1 heart every 30 minutes and the levels get progressively harder when you hit the higher ones.

Although the game is free to download and play, the downside is that the game is only available to the Nintendo 3DS console family, which could cost you anywhere from RM500-RM800 for one. But if you already have one, you should definitely check this game out!

#throwback anime - Free! Iwatobi Swim Club & Free! Eternal Summer!

This week's #throwback anime features Free! Iwatobi Swim Club and Free! Eternal Summer, a production of Kyoto Animation.

Free! Iwatobi Swim Club (Season 1) was released in summer 2013, while Free! Eternal Summer (Season 2) premiered in summer 2014. The franchise enjoyed relative popularity that expanded to multiple media such as radio shows, manga, light novels, drama CDs, multiple character songs CDs and other merchandises.

*This is only the character songs CDs for season 1!
The story revolves around Haruka Nanase, a boy who has always loved to be immersed in water, and to swim in it. The first season story focus on the formation of the club and the eventual match with their rival school. The first season is more lighthearted with jokes, gags(especially on the male leads girly names), fan service and occasional shipping of the male leads (to please target audience group), but it does prepare the viewers a basic understanding of each character and their own struggles in growing up and apart.

In the second season, Haruka and co. is now in their third year and facing decisions regarding their future. The second season takes a more serious theme of making a decision for yourself and growing up to a young adult. It also explore some sports related themes such as injury and age in the sports world (only a little). It still keeps the occasional fan services but are more toned down.

Opening songs for both season is sung by OLDCODEX a JRock band with lead vocalist Tatsuhisa Suzuki (VA for Tachibana Makoto), while ending song is performed by the male leads VA band called "Style Five".

Cast includes:
Nobunaga Shimazaki
Tatsuhisa Suzuki
Tsubasa Yonaga
Daisuke Hirakawa
Mamoru Miyano
Here's a picture of them doing funny poses!

Overall it is an enjoyable boy's love sports anime. Hehe

Gamer Weekend: Aura Kingdom

If you had read the previous post about Dragon Nest: Warrior's Dawn, you might have seen me mentioning Aura Kingdom. If you haven't you can check out the post here.

Aura Kingdom (幻想神域 or Fantasy Frontier）, like Dragon Nest is an anime based MMORPG (Massive Multi-player Online Role Playing Game) developed by X-Legend and published by Aeria Games. Open beta started on 6th January 2014 and I started playing then. The game started with a level cap of 75 and content up to level 50 with 8 different classes. The game is free-to-play with an in game cash shop/item mall. The game main feature is the eidolon system where players are accompanied by summoned pets in the form of beautifully crafted deities and spirits. There are now a total of 12 playable classes, level 75 contents and a level cap of 80.

As with any other MMORPGs I played, I chose the Bard class (support/healer) as my main character and quickly started my adventure in the vast world of Aura Kingdom. The early levels of the game was fairly easy, you can easily reach level 50 within a few hours of game play, but after that leveling will start to slow down (as with any other games). The story that drives the players out from the small little port town Port Skandia and into a big war between the forces of good and evil is beautifully written (I cried when my character finish his level 60 quest to greet his hometown families and friends before the big battle T_T). The interface and controls are easy to understand and learn and stats distribution are easy.

Major downside of the game though are server issues, DDoS attacks, farming bots, and slow content updates. New content updates may take 2-3 months before implementing and that leave a lot of players nothing to do while waiting for new contents. Hence a trend of player surge during the first few weeks of a new content being released (I'm one of those guys now). But it is an enjoyable game and was one of the games that I truly enjoyed since Flyff. Do give this a try if you ever have the time and you might find yourself hooked. Cheers!

That's all.

Let’s watch Dragon Nest: Warrior’s Dawn

So this movie came out recently in SEA(Philippines to be precise), and I thought “let’s give this a try!”.

Dragon Nest is a MMORPG release back in 2010, I played the game for some time between my shift from Eden Eternal to Aura Kingdom back in 2014. It was instanced-base grinding, meaning there’s literally no mobs on the open field. Quest were quite easy and have a good story to run though with memorable NPCs. We also get some CG storytelling after completion of major quest. But like all MMORPG, it gets bored after reaching a certain level and grinding seems to take forever (Yes I quit the game).

Production of the film is by a Chinese-American film company, with most of the crew being Chinese. Animation is in its own league, pleasing to the eyes and voice acting was okay I guess. The main character Lambert has a quirky and childish style to it that brings out the charm of his character.

The story takes place during the Black Dragon Raid (50 years ago – pre-game), and is a story of Lambert and his master Barnac, joining with notable characters such as the Geriant, Argenta and other members of the Six Heroes. The premise and execution of the film has an uncanny resemblance to Lord of the Rings, just think of the black dragon as Sauron minus the ring part. We also get a bunch races allying with each other forming a party to slay Sauron black dragon. Yeah, get what I mean? Don’t expect too much and you will be fine I guess. But we do respect their guts of making 3(planned) films based on a MMORPG.

If you want ever want to watch Lord of the Rings: The Animation, do give this a try and maybe you will find yourself downloading the game client while you’re watching the movie. Hehe

That’s all.

*side note, the dragons looks more like griffins than dragons that is more popularly depicted.

腐男好介绍 - 《ほんと野獣》（野蛮情人）

各位腐男腐女，这个会是一个我介绍一些耽美作品的平台。
第一步要介绍的作品，就是山本小铁子老师的《ほんと野獣》，又名《野蛮情人》。罗马字念Honto Yajuu。

认识山本老师的同学们应该知道老师的漫画多数为暧昧，H戏会少一点。而且也不会很长。
《野蛮情人》目前已经刊登到第17话，单行本也出到第8本了！（是山本老师目前最长的，而且还在连载中的系列）
《野蛮情人》多数以2到3话为一章，而每一章都会有H的部分（不像老师平时的作风）。

故事情节是一个黑帮少爷恋上警察帅哥的爱情搞笑故事。途中有各种各样的小插曲，也有一些小角色的章节。

目前《野蛮情人》有3张Drama CD，也就是第一本到第三本的情节。
出演者：
攻（上田朝春）的是： 中村悠一
受（后藤田辉）的是： 柿原徹也
*尖叫！！*
柿子和中村！ 格雷和纳兹 （羞羞）

《野蛮情人》现在是刊登在GUSH月刊（每月7日出售），和《お参りですよ》（山本老师的另一个作品）轮流连载中。如果从来没有接触过老师的作品话，可以从这个作品开始看起哦！

#throwback anime - Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun(月刊少女野崎君)

So, part of the newly resurrected blog. I'm going to try to do #throwback anime, it will be a like a review/introduction to the anime that aired a few seasons back, for those that have unfortunately missed out on the series.

For the first #throwback anime we're gonna look at Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun. Which was aired on the summer of 2014, if you haven't heard of it yet, its a love comedy of a girl that falls for guy that draws shoujo manga. The series play on the gender role swapping and it is a really fun series to watch. The cast are awesome especially Mikorin (Yes, I'm smitten)

The anime is adapted by Dogakobo studio from a 4-koma webcomic by Izumi Tsubaki.
Notable cast includes:
Nakamura Yuuichi (Gray from Fairy Tail),
Nobuhiko Okamoto (Eiji Niizuma from Bakuman),
Ari Ozawa (first major role),
Mamoru Miyano (A lot of anime lolx)
and other awesome people.
The anime received great reception and had a very good disc sales in Japan. If you're not much of a shoujo manga fan, you should definitely try this one out, although classified as shoujo genre, its definitely a gem in its own.

That's all for now!