August 2008

Comiket 74 is Here, and Lots of Type-Moon News

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So Comiket 74 has come to a pass, and again history has been re-written! Hopefully after this post, I'll stop writing so many Type-Moon-related posts and focus more on other stuff so this place doesn't turn into a TM fansite. First of all, this summer the TM people attended the convention not in the industry area, but the doujin area surrounded by BL groups, and as it turns out, the line to their booth, Bamboo Broom, was so long that it was legendary (poor Ed), I'm sure there are going to be blogs talking about it somewhere (Edit: Here it is!).

Anyway, back to the meat of the story, the new Kara no Kyoukai chapter that was released, "Mirai Fukuin," is nothing short of amazing. Aside from the short comics included, the story is also very interesting (not just the tabletop conversation as told in the original manuscript). Without further ado, here's a brief summary of the story and the comics that came with it.

[ If you haven't realized already, the following content contains major spoiler! ]

[ Also, it is assumed that if you read this, you have at least some idea of what KnK is about and who the characters are! ]

Farewell GameHippo

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Many should have come across GameHippo at one point or another. Nearly a decade old, GameHippo (http://gamehippo.com/) is a freeware PC game download site with a huge index of games of all kinds, no shareware, no demos, just free games. At its prime, GameHippo was THE site to go to for updates on the latest freeware games, and GameHippo was the site that got many people into independent/free games (myself included).

Of course, two things usually happen to big sites that are really, really old. They either get bigger, or they become stagnant and die a slow death. Unfortunately, GameHippo seems to have taken the second route, as updates slowed and fewer and fewer new games showed up on the site (all the while newer, more hip sites popped up everywhere). In April 2007, GameHippo's founder and writer Boson (who, according to rumors, can't blow bubbles with bubblegum) sold the site after "losing interest in the scene."

Kara no Kyoukai: Mirai Fukuin

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Big, big news! The site of Takebouki has been updated with fantastic news regarding its upcoming products at Comiket 74. First, a little recap:

"A new work from 竹箒 (Takebouki, or Bamboo Broom) called "Kara no Kyoukai - the Gaeden of sinners / recalled out summer" will be released during C74. The item will be sold on August 16th at the East A-28 area."

Now, not only has the type "Gaeden" been corrected to "Garden," the site has also been updated with sexy new graphics and a slew of new info released.

Everyone Loves Braid

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A little game called Braid by Jonathan Blow was released on Xbox Live Arcade this Wednesday. The game, a simple flatformer that integrates the concept of time to create wonderful gameplay experiences, received ridiculously high scores from a slew of websites that you'd think this is the next Final Fantasy. Of course, although a PC version is said to follow sometime this year, the fact that it's a XBLA-only game at the moment means I'm not going to be playing it any time soon.

As a result, instead of rambling away with next-to-none first-hand experience of the game, I'm just going to quote some of the other review sites, which will likely produce a review just as interesting.