Accel World AMV 8 – Super Rider

Whew, another day, another Accel World AMV. ^_^ Can’t have enough Accel World! This time, I’m featuring Ash Roller, Haru/Silve Crow’s first opponent in the Brain Burst fighting game. He rides a motorcycle, thus the idea of pairing him with the Eurobeat track, Super Rider, by Mark Astley.

And Youtube version, in case Viddler is too slow. Hopefully Youtube won’t delete it.

I really enjoyed making this AMV. It’s pretty funny. 😀 I do feel sorry for Silver Crow. ハル,ごめんね。

 

[Gravi World] – Accel World AMV 7 – Super Drive

Yup, more Accel World AMV. Got the idea after perusing pixiv.net. The doujin writers are pairing Haru with Taku. タクハル or ハルタク. Well, what would be better than using the song Super Drive, the OP theme of the classic anime, Gravitation. ^_^ Enter Gravi World!

Taku knew that Chiyu like Haru, but what if the reason that Taku decided to confess to Chiyu was not because he like Chiyu, but to prevent Chiyu going out with Haru? 😀 Anyway, I got the images at the end from pixiv.net. One, Two, and Three. Word of caution though, there are plenty of NSFW image in pixiv.net, so tread carefully.

Just for comparison, this is the original Gravitation OP.

 

What would be on WWDC 2012?

I’m too focused on Accel World that I’m falling behind on the tech rumors. WWDC 2012 is coming, so what are the rumors? Every tech blogs out there seems to be talking about a larger screen iPhone. Personally, I think this year’s WWDC will pretty much be like last year’s.

1. OS X Mountain Lion.
OS X Mountain Lion has been out for testing for some time, but seems to be an even more minor upgrade from Lion. I’m sure Apple is ready to unveil some features that would entice people to upgrade. If not, what if they made it just $20, or even free?

2. iOS 6.
Nothing is much known about this, which leads me to believe that we won’t see a new iPhone till September/October like the iPhone 4S. To be honest, I don’t know what else to add for iOS, although I still have one gripe that has never been fixed. The inability of the iPod/Music app to do shuffle by album. This leaves the iPod Classic as the only iDevice that can do this.

3. iCloud updates.
Photo album sharing, or something like that. .Mac/MobileMe had a gallery where you can upload photos to be shared. This feature is gone on iCloud, which I find baffling for Apple to do so. I also hope Apple would bring back photo-casting.

I guess that would be my predictions. Maybe some new Macbook Pro/Air to excite the crowd and press? I do think we won’t see the new iPhone, and imo the next iPhone won’t be bigger. The bigger one will be the new iPod Touch, to compete with the PS Vita, as a portable gaming device. Plus, Apple has made the Touch so thin that the only sensible way to put in a higher performing chip and more battery without significantly increasing the thickness is to make it bigger.

I dunno. I used to be so excited on Apple events, but not anymore. Maybe because Jobs is gone. Part of the attraction was his keynote presentation. Or maybe because… Accel World! 😛 Burst-link!

 

Accel World AMV 6 – I Belong to You

Whew, another AMV done! Number 6, using another awesome eurobeat track, I Belong to You by Stephy. Focusing solely on Haruyuki and Kuroyukihime and their relationship.

Didn’t I say I’m addicted to Accel World? ^_^ Can’t wait for episode 8 tomorrow.

*Edit: Here’s Youtube version in case Viddler is too slow.

 

Accel World AMV 5 – She’s the One

5th Accel World AMV, yay! Now with some Eurobeat flavor, featuring a track by Karen titled “She’s the One.” Hope people enjoy it. ^_^

Oh yeah, where is number 4 you say? I was planning number 4 to be a re-edit of one of my previous AMVs, so it’s a work in progress.

*Edit: Youtube version, before they delete it.

 

Kamen Rider Accel World

Well, this is bound to happen. Found it on pixiv. Kamen Rider Accel is the second rider in Kamen Rider W. It’s bound to happen somebody will cross that with Accel World. And voila, Terui as Haru, Akiko as Kuroyukihime, Shotaro as Taku, Phillip as Chiyuri. Kinda fit actually (Akiko loves Terui, Terui used to antagonize Shotaro, and Phillip dresses like a girl). LOL

 

Accel World AMV 2

My second attempt in making an Accel World AMV, now using the ED theme song, →unfinished→ by KOTOKO.

I made all the AMVs before episode 7, and I might update them because there are great scenes in the latest episode.

 

Accel World AMV 3

Another attempt for an Accel World AMV. I happened to hear this song on another AMV, and it feels just right. This is a quickie, so not much editing involved. The song is “You’re the Best Around,” a classic 80s song from the movie Karate Kid. Enjoy. ^_^

You’re wondering this is number 3, so where’s number 2? Well, number 2 is still in progress. Coming soon.

 

The Avengers

Well, I finally watched The Avengers, the latest installment of Marvel’s super heroes movies. It’s the long awaited movie, bringing several previously standalone super heroes together: Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, and the Hulk. Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr, and Chris Hemsworth reprised their roles respectively, with Robert Downey Jr pretty much stole the show, or probably because Iron Man had the longest gap between his last movie and this one, and thus it felt more exciting seeing him again vs the other heroes. Anyway, here’s my quick impression, and yes, I will spoil the movie.

The story itself is a continuation of the setup from Captain America and Thor movies. Loki made a deal with some alien to use the energon cube, I mean that blue-cube-source-of-energy-thingy, to open a portal so the aliens can invade earth. Pretty straight forward, and the motive were already set for Loki, for revenge against Thor. Thing is, the last time we saw Loki, he fell from Asgard to the abyss. So how did he survive? I guess the “abyss” is space? Anyway, Selvig, the scientist from Thor movie is now investigating the energon cube from Captain America movie, and Loki used the situation to transport himself to earth. At the same time, he brainwashed Selvig and Hawkeye to work for him. Nick Fury then decided to assemble the heroes to get the energon cube back.

It started with Black Widow getting Bruce Banner. With the Hulk having 3 actors now with 2 non-related movies a long while back, it’s hard to relate to the character in this movie. By the way, at the end of Thor movie, Thor destroyed the bridge and thus stuck in Asgard. So how did he manage to go to earth again? And if he could, why didn’t he visit his girlfriend already? Yeah. Oh well, Iron Man is cool as always. As usual, Tony Stark arrived with the eye candy, showing how his landing pad automatically removed his Iron Man armor while he’s walking. Total geek fest. Captain America is pretty much a direct scene continuation from the end of his movie.

What’s great about this movie is the interaction between the heroes, especially Downey Jr as Tony Stark. The other heroes seemed stiff, but Tony Stark is just being Tony, making jokes and insulting everybody. It works great, and thus imo Downey stole the show. They also did a good job in balancing the heroes’ screen time. In movies with multiple main heroes, there’s a threat of having certain heroes taking a back seat. It didn’t feel this way in this movie. Even Hawkeye and Black Widow took quite big parts instead of standing by over the sideline.

How about fan service? This is something that many western movies sometime missed completely. Well, they are in the movies, enough to make fans happy, yet not too much that it makes the movie a bit corny. The best one I remember was when Iron Man and Captain America were fighting the aliens side by side, and Iron Man fired his repulser beam to Captain America’s shield and have the beams deflected to the surrounding aliens. That’s so awesome that the audience was cheering and clapping. Another hilarious part was when Hulk confronted Loki. Loki boasted how he’s a God, and the Hulk simply smashed Loki around like a toy. Again, the audience cracked up. It’s too funny. They did a really good job slipping these things in the movie. Another fan service is the Iron Man mark VII suit, which can fly on its own, matching itself to Stark’s bracelet and armored Stark on the fly, literally. It’s no extremis, but I’ll take it.

Any downside of the movie? Well, Shield is pretty much useless, i.e. they had the energon cube stolen under their nose, and their flying fortress were wrecked and did nothing during the invasion itself. The after credit scene can be hilarious and a huge eye roller at the same time.

Future storyline? It’s clear that Stark is going to use his tower as the Avengers Tower, and Thanos is going to be the next villain. My wishes? To have the X-Men and Spiderman franchise tied together with the Avengers. I want to see the live-action version of the Stark-designed Spiderman suit. Alas, Spiderman is pretty much Sony’s.

In short, The Avengers is a quick and fun action movie with enough toppings to please fans. It’s a great movie to distract me. Thumbs up, recommended. But enough distraction, back to making Accel World AMV now. 😉

 

アクセル.ワールド

Accel World, a new anime based on a light novel by the same name. It’s been a while since I’m interested deeply into an anime, and I can say that I am officially addicted to Accel World. How addicted? Let’s just say I have watched the anime episodes at least three to four times back to back, and re-read the manga over and over. Not sure how long my attention span would last, but so far, this is THE anime in my brain. Heck, I even start to lose interest in Kamen Rider, my usual top notch franchise for my attention. You can tell since I replaced my Kamen Rider avatar with Haru.

So, what is this all about? Let’s start with the background, the technology, which is incredibly interesting by itself especially for a gadget geek like me. The story takes place in the year 2046. In this year, the technology to create a virtual reality directly fed into your brain is commonplace. Think Google glasses + The Matrix. Instead of glasses, the device is attached behind the neck like a collar. The device creates a virtual desktop space in front of the user’s vision where he/she can interact with a PC-like OS UI (complete with file manager, windows, email clients, viewing pictures and videos, sending and receiving files, etc). User interacts with the UI just like having a computer in front of them, where they use their fingers to touch and move the UI components. From a 3rd party point a view, the user will look like he/she is typing/moving around his/her fingers on thin air. This neuro link interface can connect to another interface via wired or wireless connection. According to the story, wired connection bypassed the built-in firewall, and only used with people that trust each other (eg. family members, lovers) as one can do malicious things without the user knowing (also portrayed in the story). The interface can also connect to a greater network (eg. a school or hospital intranet), and to the “global network,” presumably the evolution of the internet. Connecting to the global network is optional, but it is used for many things, including transferring funds and gaming. Intranets like the school network can offer their own virtual environment, even something that akin to MMORPG where students design and use avatars to interact with each other, even playing games, all in a virtual world.

In this world, CCTV cameras are also common place, especially in schools. Although not fully explored, cars are also very tightly controlled with an AI for safety to the point that accidents are rare, although there are ways to defeat the system.

Amongst the young people, exists an underground fighting game called Brain Burst. This game is not known to the adults as one of the requirements is that the user being equipped with a neuro link interface since birth. The game software basically overclock the human heart’s “clockspeed” to speed up brain activity a thousand time over, thus the user is in an accelerated state where he/she is outside the normal time plane and the world around him/her seem to freeze/incredibly slowed down. This ability called burst link, and the players are called burst linkers. This ability allows the user to gain advantage in many things in real life, but using this ability requires burst point, which is only obtainable through fighting other burst linkers.

Now to the characters. The main character is a chubby kid named Haruyuki Arita (Haru) that is frequently bullied in school. His escape venue is the virtual world, where despite his avatar being a cute pig, his activity and movements have no restriction and he is the top scorer of the in-game squash game. His performance piqued the interest of Kuroyukihime, his senpai and vice president of the student council. She invited Haru to install the Brain Burst program, allowing him to gain the burst link ability, and also fight as Silver Crow, his fighting avatar.

To a casual anime viewer, this is just the typical fighting anime (main character that is starting weak and going through pain and gain fighting stronger and stronger opponents). But for some reason, this franchise captivates me. Not too sure why. Is it the tech involved? Many western fiction often paint our future world as grim and doom despite the advance technology (Star Trek being the exception, which is why I love that franchise too). Japanese fiction seems to have a more positive spin on the future world of technology, as shown how the neuro link devices used in education and student interaction in this anime (compare this to the likes of Blade Runner, The Matrix, or Minority Report). Is it the cute characters? Is it the story itself? The great voice actors? Kuroyukihime is pretty much the staple of a loli (yeah, tons of you-know-what doujins are already made). Coupled with Chiyu-chan, Haru’s childhood friend, and future characters, it’s akin to the typical school/cute harem genre. Haru’s pig avatar is adorable too. I’m a sucker to anime depicting romantic school life.

I’m also a sucker to highly touching moments, which this anime has plenty of. In fact, here is one of the best scene in the anime so far:

Is it the awesome soundtrack? Just listen to the BGM of the clip above. The even more awesome OP and ED songs? The opening theme song is “Chase the World” by may’n. The ending theme song is “→unfinished→” by KOTOKO. Both are highly addictive fast-paced songs. I made an AMV using the opening song, reflecting the technology in Accel World, Haruyuki’s life in real and virtual world, his introduction to Kuroyukihime, funny and touching moments with Chiyu-chan, and his fight against his other best friend turned enemy, Takumu.

I’ll be following this franchise with a passion. Heck, I even signed up for Hulu Plus just to be able to watch the latest episode ahead of the fansubbers. I already ordered/pre-ordered the OP and ED CDs. The anime is fansubbed by plenty of groups (or you can catch it via Hulu Plus). The manga has also been translated. The light novel has partial translations here and there. The you-know-what doujins are plentiful. I couldn’t get the songs out of my head. It’s official, I’m addicted to Accel World! ^_^

By the way, I got the avatar from this pixiv user. Pixiv has a ton of cute drawings, but of course, tread carefully, as there are a ton of NSFW pictures too. 😉