Yeah, I know, we're coming on 2010, and still nothing for 2009. What happened? Well, the gaming world sucked me in again, and the anime world spat me out. I've especially gotten back into City of Heroes. My friend has a Super Group on there called House of the Wayward Soul, so I've been running around getting prestige so he can buy lots of cool stuff for the group. I've also gotten to a higher level (22 at the moment), which is high enough to start really experiencing some of the fun stuff like inventions and more interesting villain groups. There's also the Christmas event and free server transfers for characters right now. I've also discovered the tailor, which you can visit and add a new costume, for a fee, every ten levels, or so. I still mostly solo, but every now and then I'll team. I'm really still a bit anti-social there.
As for anime, well...I have been going to various conventions, mostly to see how they run differently to the one I staff called Geek.Kon.
I was added as Staff Artist last year, and I'd like to keep doing it. I've gotten a lot better at handling Photoshop, even though I still only use Elements. I've also thought about going into costuming, but there you have major expense, too. And that's the root of the problem when it comes to anime for me. The expense is just too much. I just can't afford to pay $30 for 3 episodes. The vendor from Anime Palace told me the whole hobby is going down. People see that they can get DVD's of quality American (or in the cases of Huntik and Winx Club, Italian) cartoons like Wolverine and the X-Men and Avatar: The Last Airbender for peanuts, and wonder why they have to pay so much for so little when it comes to anime. In their minds, they're getting ripped off. It is a bargain from the viewpoint of the Japanese producers, since anime DVD's can start at $80 and up in Japan. Additionally, a lot of videos from streaming sites are being removed due to copyright infringement, or the sites are being shut down all together. This it the case with the sites I had found. Some, like Crunchyroll, have gone legit with some pay-to-use features. You can't blame them, anime companies are feeling the crunch, too. It's just that I've gone through my Naruto phase back in 2004-2006, and I have fond memories of it. but I'm ready to move on now. I don't really care if they're offering it for free because I don't watch it anymore.
The thing is, even with a subscription fee and buying booster packs for costumes and powers, CoH, as City of Heroes is called, is far more cheaper than all the anime I used to buy. Even upgrading my computer, or buying a new one, is worth the price. I can't really use an anime DVD for much else, other than passively watching the show. I guess I could get back into writing fanfiction [I had written a couple of DBZ yaoi fics featuring Trunks and Android 17 ;) ], or doing fanart. But there just isn't the draw for me anymore. The shorter series and movies seem the best bet for now. I can watch them quickly and then get back to the stuff I really want to do. Kill things on my computer!
Anyway, you'll notice I've removed the "Eye Candy" videos and the photo gallery. The videos went, since Youtube seems to like removing creativity from the site every so often. Especially if this creativity involves other peoples' music and video edited together. I've come across a Team Fortress 2 video that was removed, but through diplomacy and climbing the ladder of bureaucracy, the creator has managed to get it back online there. The photo gallery is gone because it simply added too much of clutter, making it hard to notice the table of contents kind of thing I have. I think I called it "Recent Viewings" or some such, but it's supposed to make it easier for people to search postings based on the anime they feature without having to go through the calender. I took all the pictures off of various websites, and most can be still be found in the original reviews. In a fit of trying to organize my Photobucket account, I went and moved a bunch of pictures into folders based on series, even though I was warned that I'd be breaking links by doing so. I've gone through on this version of Anime Impressions and removed the broken links.
So the blog still isn't quite dead yet, at least not in my mind. I just haven't seen anything worth posting about except for maybe Higurashi. But then, I like to write reviews as soon as it's fresh in my mind. I've already got another series I seem to only be able to find on Veoh called Kaiba. We watched it in Anime Club last semester, but I stopped going to club on account of differences with the current president. I'm not a student anymore, so I don't really have any say in rather we have a serious viewing or a riff fest (as he seems to think everything that comes out of his mouth is a jewel). Yet something else that has made it more difficult for me to enjoy the hobby.
