Fred the Barber

I started playing Persona 1 years ago because of the PSP re-release at a time while I was looking for portable games. I found it really boring and put it down, and it then took a lot of coaxing for me to give the series another try. 1.5 years ago I played P4G, which I adore, and then half a year ago P3P, which is also amazing. So, I can at least assure you that playing those two, in that order, will likely still be a great experience, even though you didn't enjoy Persona.

There are two groups: 1) Anime I've watched gets placed on shelves by how much I like it. Top shelf is best, second-from-top is second-best, etc., No ordering within shelves. So, when I refer to a show as "top shelf", it's both a metaphorical bar terminology reference and a literal truth! This organization scheme means that, rarely, things on have to move down, when I watch something truly excellent. Toradora! will probably be the next to move down from the top shelf. Second-from-top shelf is generally still very good. Anything below that, I probably didn't care much for. That said, as I watch more good stuff, the "minimum acceptable quality" line gradually goes down, and presumably I'll just store away the bad stuff somewhere. 2) Stuff I haven't watched yet is on the bottom shelf, and is effectively a pile from which I arbitrarily pick things to watch. I've tried using it like a queue, but this doesn't really work for me since the "what should I watch next?" decision depends so heavily on the mood I'm in right when I start watching a new show.

I can preorder a version that comes with a full soundtrack? Why, Amazon? Why can I not preorder my box of shit through you yet?

Hmmmm. While I have feelings of inferiority in some spheres, I don't think I feel that way strongly enough for it to merit being called by such a strong term. So, false I'm already well aware of what tinnitus is, and even if I weren't, I am able to internet. But this place is kinda like Jeopardy!: there's a certain format that is followed. Next person also likes cute girls.

Having finished all three routes once last night, tonight I wrapped up the remaining two endings to Fate/Stay Night (the "Good" ending for UBW and the "Normal" ending for Heavens Feel). My thoughts on the endings for those two routes: And aside from those thoughts specifically about endings, here are some thoughts about the Heavens Feel route in general:

I did mention it once in my awkward introduction thread (which I won't link because, well, it's awkward), but I'm a software engineer.

I know someone who reliably gets migraines after eating food containing a certain very common food dye (I forget which one - Red number something), so she watches her diet very carefully to avoid it. So, yeah, there's probably something to that bit. An actual confession for something I feel moderately self-conscious of: I'm interviewing someone at work next week who is thinking about an internal transfer to my team. Was flipping through the CV, realized the person is probably about the same age as I am, and also saw a mention that they have a hobby of working on video games, and thought, "cool, a real kindred spirit here". I got a meeting invite for the interview, which automatically populated an employee photo of them on my screen, and discovered she's a cute girl. So, now I'm somewhat unreasonably excited, and hoping she aces the interview so I can enthusiastically recommend hiring her.

True. I find it hard to imagine there are people who haven't had such doubts, though... maybe young kids? The referenced post didn't make a statement about one of my qualities. Next person is a fan of Jorge Luis Borges.

I'm not saying anything about Gintama, since I've not seen it, but I can't resist commenting on this particular point... this trend seems to be generally true about crowd ratings of shows, except for extremely exceptional cases (read: Haruhi). There is a very obvious reason why an increase in rating for later seasons would occur, completely independent of actual relative quality within a show's lifetime: simple self-selection. Most of the time, if someone doesn't like a show, they stop watching it rather than moving on to the next season. So later seasons of shows are seen almost exclusively by people who enjoyed earlier seasons, and not seen by people who either didn't watch or didn't like the earlier seasons, resulting in later seasons having higher ratings than earlier seasons, regardless of whether they're actually better. The effect is most pronounced when going from Season 1 to Season 2, but it seems to pretty much continue through the lifetime of a long-running show (unless/until the show completely screws up, of course; again, Haruhi). I looked at the only two long-running shows I could think of which have separate ratings for each of their seasons: MariMite and Natsume Yuujinchou. Ratings for both of them show this trend pretty perfectly, on both MAL and animenewsnetwork.com's ratings. Side note: MariMite is way up there on my list of "favorite things ever", and everybody should watch it. I really need to finish setting up my MAL so I can link it from my profile, but there are so many things to add and I'm so lazy... Drop YuYuShiki. The art isn't good, the characters aren't interesting to watch, and nothing happens. I have no problem with Slice of Life as a genre (I really liked Non Non Biyori, for instance), but you at least need to have characters that are fun to watch to pull it off; YuYuShiki is just bad.

Yeah, I had the same experience. A lot of the choices really felt like a coin-toss as to which one was the "right" answer. I wish the game just had fewer choices, so I wouldn't accidentally die so often. Well, to be clear, I'm fine with games that have lots of choices in the common route which influence my subsequent fate. Once I'm on a route (or failed to reach any route, though this generally only happens to me when I intentionally do it, or in Katawa Shoujo because that game hates the way I think), I'd be perfectly happy with the rest of the game being on rails and having no bad endings. Bad endings tend to just upset me. I actually quite distinctly recall the first Bad Ending I ever experienced, while playing Haruka's route in Little Busters!.

False, but my mother is, so I'm worried I'll develop it when I get older (it only happened to her some 5-10 years ago). While it would be far from the end of the world, the idea of cutting dairy out of my diet entirely sounds extremely annoying... Next person tends to wear nerdy T-shirts.

So I wrapped up Heavens Feel, but am left uncertain on one point: do I want to see the "Good Ending"s as well as the "True Ending"s, for both Unlimited Bladeworks and Heaven's Feel? In the interest of not having too much spoiled for me, a simple "yes, you should get those other endings" or "no, you shouldn't" is sufficient

I'm nearing the end of the Heaven's Feel route in F/SN, and reached this gem of a decision which made me smile a lot:

worth all the

Next person knows how to play this game.

Eclipsed's not-so-subliminal messaging got to me. I'm leaning towards picking up the all ages version of Princess Evangile as my next VN, after I finish the last route in F/SN within the next couple of days. I'm looking for something that is - mostly very light - with substantial interaction between the female characters (preferably during a long common route, but as long as there's lots of people running around in a character route, that's ok too) - containing little or no H-content - ideally, involving substantial feels during character routes, though this is negotiable Basically, I'm looking to play Little Busters! again, but, you know, a different game. I don't have expectations that I'll get that same experience, of course, but am I right that all-ages Princess Evangile meets those criteria at least?

9/10. Good hair style, interesting background, but maybe a little too zoomed out. Would probably be 8/10, but umbrellas/parasols are always worth an extra point.

True, unfortunately. However, at this:

False, but I will next time I see one (within reason - if it's like several feet deep, I'm not getting soaked just so I can tell you guys I stole a nickel). Next person avoids using cash whenever possible.

Confession: I almost always prefer dubbed anime over subbed.

4/10. Some combination of pose, lighting, and outfit is making that look really unnatural to me. I get the impression she's supposed to be a slim girl, but the elements come together to make it look to me like she's massively pregnant. And then there's the facial expression.

but not really

For the third consecutive time, make a grab for the hat.