Four Years Already?

Hey all, I’m interrupting your regularly scheduled Serial Saturday to celebrate with a post on my 4th anniversary since I started Windborne’s Story Eatery. It’s been Four Years Already?

So first off I’d love to say I was able to make this my fourth year of daily posts without interruption, but as long time readers will know that isn’t the case sadly. Shortly after my third year anniversary post my old Mac Pro, which I had for 9 years at that point, finally kicked the bucket. I lost everything I had on that computer, from my entire iTunes library with hundreds of eBooks that I had gotten in PDF format or dozens of Audiobooks, to all my reviews I had written for Game Industry News and many, many other things. I wasn’t able to recover any of it, despite trying for weeks and frankly it really sucked, I’m still trying to get all the music I lost, 99.99% wasn’t through iTunes due to being from overseas. For those who don’t know iTunes doesn’t allow for you to re-download Audiobooks through them which is why I stopped buying anything  from iTunes years ago.

Now for the reason why I had to take such a long break afterwards and posted pretty much not at all until mid April was due to the fact I was trying to decide whether I wanted to build my own computer or get a pre-built one.  I finally decided to get a pre-built one from Doghouse Systems. It’s not the fastest thing ever, and I know I could’ve gotten a better machine if I built it myself. However I have no idea really how to do that, and I have a minor disability when it comes to gross motor skills, in addition to having my hands shake constantly. My hand shaking has gotten better over the years and it’s not even a noticeable thing unless you really look closely. However I still can’t hold a camera to take a picture worth a damn without it ending up a blurry mess. If I couldn’t do something as simple as that without messing up I wasn’t comfortable with spending money on buying the parts to build myself a computer. So I’ll apologize for having to take such a long break, and then easing back into the daily posts. I took my editors at GiN’s advice and got back in slowly.

While I’m finally back to full speed I can’t promise that I won’t have to do something similar in the future. I don’t know what the future holds, and if something happens that really affects me I may take a break from writing for a while to get myself back together. I’ll write a short post, though it probably will be only a few sentences long. Hopefully I won’t have to do that before writing my fifth year anniversary post.

Now as for my various columns’ futures, the majority of them won’t be changing at all. The newcomers, Serial Saturday and Movie Monday are both column topics I had in reserve for if something happened or I ran out of material for a column. Serial Saturday will be permanently taking over for Sensate Saturday, unless I, for some odd reason, feel like talking about mental health topics in which case I might make a post under that category. Or that might happen when I run out of stuff to cover for Movie Monday, I don’t know right now.

I’ll be honest, I don’t watch a ton of movies anymore, in fact until I had gone to see The Last Jedi on Christmas Day this past year I hadn’t been in a movie theater in over four years. Mostly it’s due to me being highly sensitive to sound and going to the theater quickly gives me a sensory overload. It’s not a pleasant experience for me, or anyone I’m with as I get pretty irritable. So Movie Monday isn’t a long term column I had planned. It was supposed to be a column I used in only the worst emergencies until I had built up a decent enough stockpile of stuff I had read or done until I could move onto something else. Manga Monday might return, and probably will. However it may be limited to my Quick Review style of posting. Whether that’s a temporary thing or not will depend on whether I can find a reliable alternative to Batoto, which had tons of obscure series that I could use for the column.

Couple last things about Movie Monday, it might not be limited to me covering movies themselves. I might talk about production or directorial decisions and whether I agree or disagree with them. I’ll also likely end up breaking my own rule about covering stuff that is really main stream and new, like a Star Wars movie.  I don’t want to resort to such things, and if I can avoid doing so I will, but I make absolutely no promises when it comes to this column. It wasn’t meant to last me forever and I don’t have nearly the time to start binge watching movies just to write about them.

That’s it for my post, and I hope you, my readers, will continue to read my columns whether it’s on Windborne’s Story Eatery or Game Industry News. Your regularly scheduled Serial Saturday will return next week!

Introducing Serial Saturday and Movie Monday

Hey all so I’ve got a post giving a brief explanation of my two new columns, one of which already has a post! Introducing Serial Saturday and Movie Monday!

New Columns? What?!?: Well in case you didn’t read last Saturday’s post, I’ll briefly explain what’s going on. Due to Bato.to’s shutdown I’ve had to implement plans I had in reserve for emergency situations. I’m replacing my Manga Monday and Sensate Saturday columns with something else. These are Serial Saturday and Movie Monday.

Serial Saturday? What’s that?: Serial Saturday is an idea for a column I’ve had in mind for the past year and was planning to have replace Sensate Saturday on my 4th Anniversary of my Blog. However that plan got thrown out the window with the announcement of Batoto’s shutdown last week. The column will cover various Web Serials, or Web Novels, and will focus on amateur authors. I’ll be getting this stuff from around the web, but everything will be written in English. The author doesn’t necessarily have to be a native speaker, and I may do some serious critiques on grammar for those who deserve it, but nothing I post in Serial Saturday will be translated works.

I have a huge amount of content piled up for this column, and it will operate similarly to my Translation Necessary Thursday posts. I’ll cover a set number of chapters each week of a certain series, and I’ll try to switch up between various series. I can’t promise that will always happen, because I might need to restock my supply of chapters. There are some points I need to make, I will try to cover unpublished works, however some of the stuff I’ll cover will inevitably be published in eBook format on Amazon or similar places. So the distinction between Bookish Wednesday and Serial Saturday posts will come down to one thing. Any series that has a professionally produced Audiobook will be covered in Bookish Wednesday. Everything else will be valid for Serial Saturday.

Movie Monday?: Well in case you didn’t read the latest Monday column, I’ll be covering various movies I’ve seen and do my usual thing, I’ll try covering cinematography as well as my usual categories, but I am no movie expert. In fact I have absolutely no confidence that I’ll be able to write this column in the long term. Due to various circumstances I don’t watch movies very often, so I have a very limited stock of material. I don’t have the time to dedicate to watching a movie for a post every week, so if I run out of material to cover before I can resume the Manga Monday column, I will most likely have to forgo my Monday columns. I hope that I won’t have to do that, but I might have to do so if things really go poorly in the Manga translation scene. I’m not a great reader of Japanese, so I can’t judge most series if they are untranslated.

That’s it for this post, I’ll be back next week for my first Serial Saturday post!

End of an Era

Hey all so I wasn’t at all expecting to have to write this post. So it will be rather brief, and while I’m not taking a break from writing, I am going to have to change my columns for a while, maybe permanently.

What’s Up?: So for those unaware Bato.to is shutting down permanently on the 18th of this month. It’s a huge loss to the Manga community at large, and while some of you might say “Michael they supported Pirates” That isn’t true. Any licensed series were not hosted on Batoto.

So Why Are Things Changing?: I used Batoto almost exclusively to find obscure series for my Manga Monday and Sensate Saturday columns. Losing easy access to such a large repository of content is going to seriously put a hamper on what I’ll be able to read for material to write about in those columns.  So things are going to have to change, maybe permanently.

What’s Changing?: Well obviously my Manga Monday and Sensate Saturday columns are going to be put on hold and replaced with something else. I’ve had a backup type of content in the wings in case something like this happened, although I wasn’t expecting it to occur because of Batoto shutting down. The Sensate Saturday series has a high chance of being permanently shelved in favor of that backup, and while I have tons of content to write about for that column that’s it. I do have a temporary solution for my Monday columns, however I have absolutely no confidence in that being a permanent solution due to the nature of what I’ll be writing about and my own personal disabilities and challenges. The worst case possibility that occurs is that I have to stop writing my Monday columns permanently after I run out of material for my temporary replacement of Manga Monday. Hopefully by the time I’ve run out of material the Manga translation scene will have calmed down enough. That however is an unknown and I can’t promise anything.

What Are You Going To Write About?: Well I’ll keep that under wraps for now, though I will say that Monday’s post is going to be fiery. That’s the sole hint you’ll be getting from me. If by some miracle someone manages to guess what I’m writing about and posts their guess in the comments I’ll be shocked. And yes this is a complete and shameless attempt to get people to post more comments on my posts.

That’s it, I hope you’ll all forgive me for having to do this, but circumstances have forced me to put plans in action that I was hoping I’d never have to do.

Sensate Saturday: Hakase to Slime-chan by Isaki Nayuta

This week for Sensate Saturday I’ve got a more upbeat story. It’s Hakase to Slime-chan by Isaki Nayuta!

Plot Synopsis: A Professor had created what he hoped to be an artificial human, but what came out of the large holding tube wasn’t a human, but a Slime?!?

Plot: The plot is very Slice of Life and more about comedy than anything else. There is no action, no damsels to save or Demon Kings to vanquish. Just a guy who wanted to make an artificial human and got a slime instead.

Characters: Both the professor and Lime are amusing, however they are not incredibly deep character wise. This may change in later chapters of the series, but I haven’t read ahead of the currently translated material. So while they are amusing, and somewhat heartwarming, it wasn’t enough for me to want to find the untranslated chapters of this completed series.

Art: The art is okay, not super amazing and nowhere near Shueisha level of quality, but it’s in full color which is a bit of a rarity when it comes to Manga, although this technically is a Webtoon or Web Comic where such things are much more commonplace.

Overall: If you’re bored this might be worth a quick read.

For those who like: Slice of Life, Supernatural Stuff, Decent Artwork.

Not for those who don’t like: Any of the above.

Sensate Saturday: Otonari Complex by Nonomura Saku

This week for Sensate Saturday I’ve got another Quick Review. It’s Otonari Complex by Nonomura Saku!

Plot Synopsis: Kuji Akira and Ninomiya Makoto have been neighbours and friends from childhood. Akira is handsome and Makoto is pretty.  Their feelings for each other are growing more complex just as they are finding themselves the focus of romantic interest of their friends and acquaintances…

Plot: The plot is pretty good. I’ve probably read a few series with similar if not exactly the same plot device as it’s core drive, but I can’t remember them right now (still sick and I’m writing this in advance due to holidays), however I enjoyed this quite a bit even if I think I may have read something similar before. Or I might not have, doesn’t matter to me, I enjoyed Otonari Complex quite a bit.

Characters: Akira and Makoto are our two leads and they are pretty awesome, but still wasn’t expecting that to occur. Either way I really enjoyed their characters. So I’ll probably end up reading this series in full one day. Once it’s fully completed probably.

Art: The art is very good, it’s comparable to Shueisha levels of work, if not meeting that standard.

Overall: A great read, definitely worth a shot.

For those who like: Slice of Life, Drama, Romance, School Life, Interesting Plot, Great Lead Characters, Excellent Artwork.

Not for those who don’t like: Any of the above.