Medaka Box Abnormal (1)

Holy Shit

We’re back! Sorry for the long delay. It’s been over 9 months since we last released anything.

In any case, here’s Helios Division’s first of three new projects: Medaka Box Abnormal. Before you ask, no, we will not do the first season. It’s too damn boring until the end. Also, several groups have done the first season’s BD’s, so you can just encode those if you want.

Stray

We’re piloting a new release schedule for this particular series. We’ll be releasing the hardsubs and softsubs for this series at both 1080p and 720p. That’s 4 releases per episode, totaling 48 deliveries for this anime. Needless to say, we won’t be keeping all of them seeded for very long, so if you want these episodes, you’ll have to download them as soon as we release them. Rest assured, we won’t be taking down the seed until we run out of space.

Other Metadata

We’re using FFF’s subs cross-checked against the official American subs/dubs + whatever our consultants say.

Torrents

Device Compatible (Hardsubs)

1080p | 720p

Regular Release (Softsubs)

1080p | 720p

-helios

P.S. If you’re wondering where the End of the Year report is and what not, here it is: We did nothing—except pay bills. That is all. Stay tuned for more anime later.

Tokyo Day 4 – Shinjuku

[DATE: 2013/10/15]
So, it’s been 5 months since I went to Tokyo, so some of the details may be a little fuzzy.

Breakfast in Shinjuku

If I recall correctly, I woke up at ~08:00 because the damn cleaners were going nuts outside. I was like,

Oh shit, not again. Damn those diligent Japanese cleaners

I got up and sprinted over to Shinjuku via the metro. The clouds had rolled in and it began to drizzle. Not a good sign. My plan in Shinjuku was to be outside for a majority of the day, so I wasn’t too happy to see the weather turn south.

I stepped into a cafe and ordered myself some breakfast, which was a ham sandwich, and then head towards the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Offices (TMGO).

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government Offices

The rain began to pick up as I made my way over to the TMGO. There was already a line of people waiting to go up to the observation deck, but it didn’t seem all that bad. A steady stream of Japanese salarymen and women were going through the building’s entrance, but visitors had to wait outside; luckily, the entrance is underneath the main lobby level, so I didn’t have to worry about getting soaked while waiting in line.

A white, middle-aged couple lined up behind me and began speaking in American English—no accent that I could discern. I struck up a conversation with them and apparently they’re actually from Saudi Arabia, which I would’ve never guessed. I swear, these two were actually CIA agents or something, because they wouldn’t tell me what they did or why they were in Saudi Arabia.

Anyways, I made it through security to the elevators, which were hosted by two polite Japanese women. They beckon us into the elevator, crammed it full of tourists, pushed one of only two buttons on the elevator panel, and wished us a good time. The doors closed and the elevator rocketed to the 45th floor in less than 30 seconds. I swear, I felt like I was standing on a fuckin rocket, because I got light-headed and my ears popped. Japanese elevators must be a hella faster than American elevators because we got to the 45th floor so fast that I was seeing stars.

Alright, now we’re on the 45th floor. Let’s take lots of pictures.

Those were my thoughts. Have some pictures.

Back to the Show | Lunch

After I took a bajazillion pictures, I got in line to head down the building. By now, it was around 12:00 so I figured it was time for lunch. After conferring with my Tokyo guidebook, I decided on a famous ramen place named “Nagi.” Apparently, they get pretty packed, but they have another, little-known, branch in Nishi-Shinjuku.

I made my way over and walked up the treacherous stairs to the ramen restaurant and sat down at an available stool. The restaurant was manned by two chefs: an older woman and a young man. The older woman said to me (in Japanese),

Please purchase a ticket for a meal

to which I responded with my usual:

Sumimasen. Nihongo ga hanasemasen (I’m sorry. I don’t speak Japanese)

to which she replied with (in perfect English):

Oh, OK. Yeah, come with me real quick. You just have to buy a ticket from this vending machine over here

Whoa. Why didn’t you say that before??

The vending machine had over 60 different listings of ramen, so the older woman recommended me a few of them.

The restaurant, itself, was super-small; no larger than 600 square feet. No joke. There was only the kitchen, the bar seats, and two very small tables on the far side of the restaurant, next to the entrance. The place only had the capacity to seat 15 people at most.

Anyways, I purchased my ticket and handed it over to the lady. After 5 minutes, the lady served me the best fucking ramen I’ve ever had in my life.

The dish looked a bit different than I imagined it. I had to dip the hot noodles into the broth and then eat it. After I finished eating the noodles, the chef poured boiling hot water into the broth and I drank it like soup. Pretty awesome dish. After that, I thanked the chef for the meal and made my way outside.

Love Hotels

To my relief, the rain had settled down a bit so I decided to take a tour of Shinjuku.

Apparently, the red-light district is in Shinjuku because I wandered into it. There were “gentleman’s clubs,” love hotels, and “relaxation parlors” in Shinjuku.

Speaking of love hotels, Shinjuku has dozens of them. I was tempted to go into one just for the hell of it, but I thought the better of it and decided to keep walking. I figured a couple with a proper tryst to attend to was in more need of a discrete hotel room than myself.

After I wandered a bit more, I fell into an electronics store and perused the merchandise until I got too tired to even stand.

The rain began to pick up again due to some typhoon that was on its way, so I made my way back to the hotel and crashed for the rest of the evening.

More on my adventure in Tokyo next time.

Stay tuned for Medaka Box Abnormal (1) later this week.

~ja-ne

-helios

End of October/November/December 2013 Report | 2013 End of the Year Report

End of October/November/December 2013 Report

This part’s pretty easy. We did nothing except pay bills. Strike’s still working on Tsubasa and the batch Is Coming™. Nothing else to report. All quiet on the western front.

2013 | Year in Review

Last year was probably the absolute worst year for N LogN EG and its staff. And by worst, I mean pretty awful.

I’ll skip everything and just move along to what we plan on doing.

2014 In Sight

Upcoming Anime

Strike is finishing up the last Tsubasa episode and he’s working on the signs. Once that shit is done, he’ll move onward to whatever the hell he wants. Not sure what, but I’m sure it’ll have less signs.

As for me, I’m working on Psycho Pass first. Should be pretty easy, since I’ll simply be laying on Commie’s subs and their stuff is probably timed properly.

I’ll also be working on Hellsing The Ultimate.

The PlayStation 4 | The Xbox One

We will in fact be encoding media for these platforms the moment we can: (1) get our hands on one and (2) the moment Sony and Microsoft release a patch that allows the playing of external media files. You currently cannot stick a USB stick into either of these systems and simply play a file. The Xbox One is the only system that actually has any type of network streaming capability, but it’s quite lackluster at the moment (gotta push via DLNA, but you can’t actively search for media files).

We’ll keep you up to date on that stuff.

-helios

Tokyo Day 3 – Akihabara

[DATE: 2013/10/14]
Alright, I’m lagging behind these big time. Luckily, I’m now at the airport with over 7.5 hours to kill, so I’ll just knock all of these summaries out right now.

Breakfast

I was starving and lazy, so I decided to hit up Denny’s in Tsukji just to see if the family diners in anime were anything like their real-life counterparts. As it turns out, yes the restaurants are exactly like the ones portrayed in anime, with the exception that the staff doesn’t wear maid outfits.

Akihabara

Early Bird

After eating the most mediocre breakfast ever, I decided to travel to Akihabara. It was around 1050 and the first thing on my list was Mandarake, but nothing in Japan opens until 1130. What the hell is up with that? The only places that are open are cafes and large fast-food chains.

Anyways, I decided to skip Mandarake and dicked around until Animate was open because it was a hella busy the day before. Seriously, you couldn’t even stop to look at a poster without having a deluge of fanboys plow you into a corner.

After getting my fill of anime merchandise, I quickly made my way to a cafe to plan my next method of attack.

Cat Cafe – Nekojalala

After a quick pitstop, I decided to hit up the famous Nekojalala.

The cafe’s entrance is quarantined from the rest of the cafe to prevent escapes. After taking off my shoes and shelving my backpack, I was led to the back and asked to read a list of english rules.

Rule 1: Do not do a cat violently

Bwhahaha. Seriously, that was the first rule. Not sure if that’s due to a poor translation or if it’s based on an anecdote. I’m gonna say the latter.

After washing my hands, ordering a compulsory drink, and reading the rules, I was allowed to play with the cats. I also ordered some tunafish to feed to the cats.

3 of the 12 or so cats were asleep and most of them were currently playing with some other guest. I just sat there and took pictures of the cats until the cafe attendant came out with the tunafish I ordered, after which all of the cats either woke up or stopped playing with whoever and bum rushed me.

The moment I started scooping tunafish into my hands I had cat paws and mouths scratching and biting my fingers. Especially this little fucker:

This gray little bastard literally stuck his face and paws into my hands the moment I presented any tunafish to any of the cats. I was barely able to feed anyone else. Once I exhausted my supply of tunafish, I chugged my beer and took a thousand photos of the cats.

After my 30 minute time block expired, I made my way out of the cat cafe and ended up paying somewhere in the neighborhood of 1500 to 2000 yen. That’s fairly expensive for a drink, some tunafish, and 30 minutes to play with cats. FML. Why didn’t I think of that?

Anyways, have some kitty pictures:

Kitty Cats

Aimless Wandering

I wandered the residential neighborhood of Akihabara and ran into this sign:

I immediately thought:

Despite the tendency for everything to be “happified” in Japan, maybe this was going a little too far

At this point, I figured I’d kill some time before I worked up the courage to go to a maid cafe. I pulled out my travel guide and found out that there’s was some sort of modern-art museum in the area. I figured that would be a good way to kill an hour or two.

Finding Musuems and Shrines

I spent 30 minutes wandering around the Chome trying to find this phantom museum and eventually gave up and settled for a random shrine instead.

I suppose a modern-art museum would be just as useful as a shinto shrine; the allure of either of those two things fails to phase me. After watching the shrine’s pet goat take a shit (not even kidding), I decided that it was time to go and made my way to the @Home Maid Cafe.

@Home Maid Cafe

I labored up 7 flights of stairs to get to the entrance to @Home Maid Cafe. I knew that it had locations on the 4th, 5th, and 6th floor, but they were fairly crowded, so I opted to go to the top floor in hopes of a shorter line.

My hopes were fulfilled. There was only one party in front of me and I was able to secure a seat in 10 minutes. After being greeted a bajazillion times with,

Okaerinasai, goshujinsama~!

I was bombarded with more rapid-fire Japanese, most of which I didn’t understand. From what I was able to gather, you can purchase various “sets” of food and activities. I simply purchased the “Dessert Set,” which included: a dessert (duh), a drink, and your choice between a photograph or a game with the maid of your choice.

I ordered a big-ass parfait (think Working!!), a mocha something or another, and opted to take a picture with a random maid, which I won’t be showing you.

Unfortunately, guests aren’t allowed to take photographs in the maid cafe, for obvious reasons, so you’ll just have to go to Akihabara and experience the cafe for yourself.

A word of advice: nobody there speaks English. Well, nobody I talked to spoke any English. The little amount of Japanese I had accumulated from Rosetta Stone, Anime, and my Japanese Phrasebook was barely enough ammunition to get through the experience.

The good news is that there was an American couple there that I was able to talk to. Their Japanese-fu was also super weak so I didn’t have to feel like a complete moron alone.

After exchanging email addresses, I decided to head back to the hotel and crash for the evening. I don’t remember what I had for dinner, but it was probably another bento from 7-Eleven.

-helios

Tokyo Day 2 – Ginza & Tokyo Station

Day 2 – Recon Ginza and Tokyo Station

[DATE: 2013/10/13]

I’m getting more and more lazy so these posts are going to get pretty terse.

Jet Lag

Woke up at around 7ish and decided to get ready. I was starving so I decided to go to the convenience store next door and grab some melon-pan filled with cream and custard. Delicious.

Before heading off, I decided to read my entire Japanese Phrasebook and bookmark important phrases. Took about an hour and a half to finish it off and mark off the most important phrases, including,

I don’t speak Japanese

And

Where’s the toilet?

Critical.

Anyways, after that, I spent another 30 minutes reading up my travel guide about the Ginza and Tokyo Station area and then I set off.

Ginza

Luckily, the weather was perfect in the morning. I decided to walk it to the Ginza district and explore the neighborhood. As it turns out, the Ginza District isn’t all that interesting. It’s basically the 5th Ave of Tokyo. Tons of high-rise, high-priced stores, with the likes of Gucci and friends easily filling out the entire district. There are also lots of large chain restaurants and expensive cafes seeding the area.

The one thing that Ginza does have plenty of are art museums. If you’re into that kinda thing, I would recommend stepping into Gallery Koyanagi and Tokyo Gallery.

I made it to the end of the main Ginza strip and decided to make my way to Tokyo Station so that I can hitch a ride on the Yamanote Line and survey the entire city.

Yamanote Line

It’s about 1100 and, by now, the temperature has kicked it up a notch. Despite the fact that there’s A/C on the trains, they’re surprisingly weak. I suppose the lack of electrical power due to the nuclear accident in 2011 has forced everyone to run everything on low.

I decided to board the Yamanote Line from Track 5, which sent the train in the clockwise direction. The train got super packed since Tokyo Station is where all the bullet trains launch from, so I stood for about two stops. It finally cleared out by Shinagawa and I grabbed a seat. At every single major stop, I tried to observe the surroundings.

I don’t remember anything really specific about the trip except that Ikebukuro and Shinjuku are a hella busy. The train filled out almost immediately at those two stations.

PASMO Issues

So apparently, if you enter and exit to and from the same station, your PASMO card goes bat-shit crazy. In fact, don’t exit and then enter the same station either. I had to talk to the train officers to get my PASMO card fixed.

Marunouchi (Tokyo Station)

Anyways, I was starving because it was around 1300. I decided to jump into some random Japanese food place and it turned out to be the most amazing Japanese lunch ever. I bought some sort of lunch package where they serve rice, grilled bbq chicken, fried something, some vegetables, miso soup, and some sort of sour fruit or something. Costed about 1000 yen. Even though it was probably normal by Japanese standards, in America that lunch would’ve costed me double what I paid.

After that, I began wandering south until I ran into the huge Bic Camera store.

Bic Camera

So, this electronics store is approximately 6 floors of loud, whizzing electronics with two basement floors for whatever home appliances. Any device that consumes electricity is probably sold here. Oddly enough, the place didn’t have as many video games as I would’ve imagined. I suppose that Akihabara fills that market well enough.

Some random store-girl came up to me and started rapid-firing some Japanese in my face and I’m like,

I don’t speak Japanese

And she’s like,

Ohhhh, no Japanese? English?

And then she literally turned around and ran. Fast.

At that point, I’m like,

OK, going to see if I can make my way out of here before she calls reinforcements and forces me to buy a PSVita

After perusing the store for an hour, I made my way to the exit.

Familiar Faces

On the way out of Bic Camera, wouldn’t ya know, I ran into that Japanese-English teacher that I met on the plane and her husband out of sheer coincidence. We literally passed right by one another and then, about 2 seconds later, we both stopped, turned around, and spotted one another.

Turns out, they needed to get some chores done at Bic Camera so they ended up going there right after lunch. We chatted it up for about 20 minutes and then exchanged email addresses so that we could link up in NYC later in life.

Hibiya Park

After parting with the married couple, I roamed into Hibiya park which was having some sort of festival. Since it was like 86 degrees outside, I decided to spend all of 10 minutes looking around. Nothing was going on.

Hmm, it was only 1500 and I didn’t wanna return to the station or explore more of Tokyo Station, so I’m like,

Fuck it. Let’s go to Akihabara and do some preliminary recon

Preliminary Akihabara Recon

I arrived in Akihabara via the Yamanote line without borking my PASMO card this time. I followed all the exits towards the “Akihabara Electric Town”. Seriously, that’s what it’s called.

Once I stepped out, I walked towards the main strip, which was a half a kilometer long. The main road was completely blocked off to traffic, so crowds filled the street area.

Right after I took that photo, I was like,

OMG, there’s the Animate store! I gotta see what this store is all about. It’s only mentioned in about 50% of every slice-of-life anime

Animate

There were about 6 or 7 floors of assorted anime paraphernalia, and none of it sparked my interest. Well, I did take a billion photos of the merchandise, but I’m not actually a collector. Besides, I can’t read Japanese and I don’t wanna have to worry about hauling stuff back to the States in my suitcase. I might end up getting some posters or something, but that’s about it.

Furthermore, that shit is expensive. Like, buying the Fate/Zero BD’s is 180000 yen or something insane. Yeah.

At this point, it’s like 1630 and I decide to head back to the hotel and crash because jet lag is a bitch.

Later

Day 3 is far more exciting, which I’ll write about later. It includes a cat cafe, a maid cafe, shrines, and more Akihabara exploration.

It’s actually Day 4 now, so Shinjuku is on the agenda for today.

-helios

Tokyo Day 1 – Flight

[DATE: 2013/10/11-2013/10/12]

Since our team can’t seem to push out any material, I’ll just go ahead and blog about my current Tokyo trip.

New York Traffic

I don’t know if any of you live in the New York City Metropolitan Area, but if you ever have to drive anywhere in it (e.g. Connecticut, Jersey, any of the boroughs of NYC itself), then you know that it’s always a complete shit-storm. This is especially true if you’re driving through the Bronx during rush-hour ever. Yet, I always inexplicably end up taking the Merritt Parkway to the Hutchinson River Parkway through the Bronx when I need to go to any of the airports. So basically, since I moved to the area 2 years ago, I haven’t learned my lesson yet and I’ve just been screwing myself over and over again.

That all aside, I decided to leave at 0600 and I was able to beat traffic to Newark Airport (70 minute drive time). Hell yeah! Now I have 3.5 hours to dick around at the airport, which sounds like a lot of time, but it passes by pretty quickly.

Long Rides

So, the flight was incredibly long—the longest I’ve ever been on. Luckily, I hadn’t seen Breaking Bad yet, so I brought all 5 seasons onboard and cranked through 1.5 seasons of amazing television! And if you ever decide to fly long distance, get Economy Plus and use Seat Guru to figure out which seat is worth paying for. I’m so happy I dumped the extra cash for that business. That and I was able to talk to a Japanese-English teacher who gave me tons of tips on Tokyo and guided me through the airport (that doesn’t come with the package though).

The flight passed by relatively quickly. I suppose the only good thing about getting a day-job is that you learn how to make massive swaths of time go by quickly. So while I can’t even sub Dog Days’ or any other anime for N LogN EG in my spare time, at least I can occupy myself on a 14 hour flight.

Navigating Narita Airport

Narita is surprisingly easy to navigate. Customs was super annoying to walk through, but once you’re into the main area, it’s totally easy. I arrived at Terminal 1 and proceeded to pick up my B-Mobile Data SIM card from the post office, which is actually in the airport.

Data SIM Cards

A little side note here, I decided to buy a B-Mobile Data SIM card so that I could use data features on my phone. It costs about $45 for 1 GB (expires in 14 days), but it’s totally worth it. The alternative would be to purchase 100 megabytes from Verizon for $25 and that wasn’t gonna work for me

Post Office

I walked up to the counter and simply just said,

Pick up

And the staff was like,

Ohh, OK. Passport?

And boom. Got my package after signing.

After that, I popped the new SIM card into my iPhone and made my way back to my hotel.

Trains

I hopped on the Access Express (Skyline Keisei Line) and rode that train all the way to Oshiage Station and then transferred to the Tokyo Metro system. After landing myself somewhere in Ginza, I began to search for my hotel.

Hotel Search

OK, so most Tokyo streets don’t have names. I knew this beforehand, but goddamn that’s the most annoying thing ever. I literally had to use all the major named roads, a compass, and the Chome to figure out where the hell I was. It was not easy. Finding the hotel took me over an hour even though it was less than 1/2 a mile from the station I exited.

The problem with their system is that if you go in “general” directions (any of the cardinal North, South, East, or West directions), you’re bound to drift because the streets aren’t laid out in a nice grid. So you also have to check which Chome you’re in, but that’s posted once every 5-10 light poles and most buildings show their address without the Chome’s district name because they assume you already know which one you’re in. That and I can’t read Japanese. Yeah, it was probably mostly that.

At some point, I was like,

Oh, I’ll just use my phone to navigate this shit

But I forgot to punch in the PAP access code so I wasn’t able to use the data plan. I realized this only after I got to the hotel and actually read the instructions like a proper human-being. After reading the only two instructions on the SIM card, I was able to get the data plan working.

It’s a good thing I decided to pack super light, because lugging around more than 10 pounds of luggage would’ve been exhausting.

Anyways, I figured it out after realizing that I was actually still wandering in the Ginza district when I thought I was in the Tsukiji district.

Jet Lag

By this time, I’d been up for about 25 hours and walking for miles around Ginza, so I decide to crash even though it was only 1830.

The plan for Day 2 (which is actually today) is to stay in the Ginza district and figure out where the hell everything is.

Pictures later. Need to get a bento and more sleep. Seeya.

-helios

End of August/September 2013 Report

Dead Quiet

Yep. Nothing has been done since we published the Gundam 00 S2 batch. Anyways, I’m here to tell you that we’re currently still under crazy schedules and what not. Don’t expect any new releases any time soon, but we should be able to do something by the end of the year.

Tokyo Trip

In other news, I’ll be going to Tokyo this week and I’ll be staying there for 9 days. I’ll be blogging and posting pictures and whatever. So if you’re interested in my escapades, check this site. I leave on 10/11/2013.

That’s all!

-Helios

Gundam 00 S2 Batch | 3rd Year Anniversary | End of March/April/May/June/July 2013 Report

Gundam 00 S2 [Re-Encode] Batch

WE FUCKING DID IT! Remember two years ago when we announced this? Jesus, it’s been way too long. I won’t even bother going into the delay factors or anything like that. Ever since we made that announcement, Helios Division hasn’t been working on anything else. But before I go into the details of why it took so long, here’s the torrent:

1080p Batch Torrent
720p Batch Torrent

Timer’s Log

OK, so why the hell did this take so long? It had nothing to do with actually timing the episodes—that only took about 20 minutes per episode. It had everything to do with proof-checking and pre-processing the subtitles themselves. I swear, that’s the last time I ever use official subtitles or whatever the fuck they were. It was like the editor had a hard-on for ellipsis; this only applied to the second season.

Here’s the actual pre-processing workflow that I had to establish for this batch:

Substitution Notation

==Punctuation Symbols==
Period = XPX
Comma = XCX
Ellipse = XEX
Semicolon = XSX
Question Mark = XQX

==Corrections==
Capitalization = =C=
Lowercase = =L=

Steps:

1. Remove the Margins
2. Remove the OP and ED
3. Move all signs to top
4. Remove all Tags
	- No regular expression
5. Remove all "\N" by using regular expressions
	a. Those with text before and after
		- REGEX: (\S*)(\\N)(\S*)
		- Replace: $1 $3
	b. Those with text before
		- REGEX: (\S*)(\\N)(\s*)
		- Replace: $1
	c. Those with text after
		- REGEX: (\s*)(\\N)(\S*)
		- Replace: $3
	d. Those without text before and after
		- REGEX: (\s*)(\\N)(\s*)
		- Replace: <string.Empty>

6. Replace all of the "double lines" (lines with more than one speaker)
	- REGEX: (.*)(,,)(-)(.*)(-)(.*)
	- Replace: $1$2$4\n$1$2$6
	+ Then Replace the ",, " (double commas with a space) with ",," (double commas without the space)
6. Go through and mark up all of the "..." with Substitution Notation
7. Remove all "..."
8. Start substituting everything

I’m not even kidding. But why did we have to do this kinda bullshit anyways? Because each subtitle file had over 300+ misplaced ellipsis and coalesced several lines into one, which is irritating if you have to style them differently.

As you can imagine this burned me out fairly quickly, which is why this release took over a year and a half to be completed—it might have taken more.

Anyways, that’s enough bitching. I never wanna see this series ever again.

The movie has been postponed in lieu of my rage-quit against the Gundam 00 franchise in general. Basically, I’ll get to the Gundam 00: A wakening movie later or maybe I’ll give it to Strikez if he ever makes it out of purgatory; more details in the reports below.

3rd Year Anniversary

I forgot about our birthday—again. But wow, can you believe it’s been over 3 years since we started this group? And We haven’t gotten any better about meeting deadlines either. We’re still alive and paying the bills, but we’ve been very preoccupied with work. Strikez started work this year and I started January 2012, but it hasn’t gotten any less busy for him or me.

Rest assured that no matter what, as long as our TODO list of anime still has titles on it, we will be operational. Albeit, we’re just going to be going very slowly.

BTW, Strikez and I actually got the chance to go to Anime Expo this year in LA. The expo was pretty awesome, but LA sucked dildos. Stay away from LA.

End of March/April/May/June/July 2013 Report

Overview

Let me summarize with this: We did nothing. That’s the report. Except for the Gundam 00 S2 batch, we did absolutely nothing but pay rent. You’re welcome.

Next Generation Systems

So we knew this question would need to be answered at some point. With the introduction of the next generation consoles, I’m debating whether to support all of the new next generation consoles as well as the current line up of devices. It really depends on the encoding requirements of the new systems. I suspect that the new systems will at least support what the current generation of consoles support, because if they didn’t, they wouldn’t be able to play Bluray movies.

I know that I’ll end up getting the Playstation 4, because I’m some sort of Sony fanatic, so we’re probably going to end up at least adding that to our lineup.

Donations

We stopped taking donations a long time ago and I can’t remember if I mentioned this or not.

What’s next?

As far as the next anime I plan on releasing, I think I’m going to go with something simple and relaxing, like Dog Days. I’m going to be helping Strikez get the Tsubasa batch out soon, but the last episode is some of the worst sign hell in history.

I’ll announce the next series soon…probably.

Strikez

This dude cannot catch a break. He’s been on mandatory OT for the past…ever and the moment he’s allowed to have his life back, I’m going to steal it away from him and force him to do the Tsubasa batch.

Special Shit

And as a final WTF in celebration of our 3rd birthday, I’m going to be releasing a little satirical summary of the latest Evangelion movie: You Can (Not) Redo. It’s in the same vain as Thumbnail Theatre and even takes some lines verbatim. Credit to whoever wrote the original jokes because they’re hilarious.

As far as the report goes, that’s all I got.

De wah.

-helios

Retrieval

Asuka: Using a land-based mecha jury-rigged to retrieve an inconspicuous space-bound tesseract seems like a dubious plan.

Mari: Whoops! I managed to become completely worthless yet again.

Asuka: Shut up, cat-girl. You’re just a vestigial character Mr. Anno created so that he could appeal to a new generation of weebo idiots. None of the original Neon Genesis fans actually like you so just sit back and meow your head off.

Asuka: Alright I remember this part from Apollo 13, so I know how to properly set the entry trajectory of orbiting space objects without frying myself to death.

Mk. 04B: Except in Apollo 13, they didn’t have to worry about Angels popping up out of nowhere.

Asuka: It’s a good thing I decided not to take any weapons with me. It’s not like we didn’t anticipate SEELE protecting their single greatest trump card for the Human Instrumentality Project.

Misato: Shhh, mum’s the word. We still have 90 minutes to fill with pompous tirades, thinly veiled as a plot, against the anime fandom.

Asuka: Shinji, you suck! And even though you’ve been in stasis for the past 14 years as LCL puree, hurry up and do something or we’re all going to die!

Unit 01 / Shinji:  ACTIVATE ABILITY: DEUS EX MACHINA!

Asuka: Well that was fortunate.

Introductions

Misato: Welcome aboard the Wunder, Shinji. Hope you don’t mind us treating you like some sort of convict and strapping an explosive dog collar around your neck. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we have some angels to fight.

Ritsuko: The situation is hopeless. We’re all just a bunch of scrubs and we’re not ready for the first boss fight yet.

Misato: It’s OK, Ritsuko. I was playing Final Fantasy the other day and I got it figured out. We’ll just turn our boat into an airship leaving our undersides completely defenseless.

Ritsuko: Well I guess we’ve been throwing common sense out the window since the first movie, so let’s see what happens when we throw logic out too.

Sakura: Whoa! Check it out, we are uh…

Shinji: …flying…in a boat. And the other battleships are also flying. Um, yeah. Wow.

Asuka: I think we’ve officially punched through the bottom of the barrel.

Ritsuko: It’s a good thing the crew and I rehearsed shouting useless techno jargon for the sake of this ridiculous fight sequence.

Sakura: It sure beats the old days when the battle was depicted entirely by us screaming at glowing hexagons on a viewscreen.

Interrogation

Shinji: So, does anyone want to explain what’s going on?

Ritsuko: I’d give you a straight answer, but then the movie would be too short.

Asuka: Shinji, you suck. Also, it’s been 14 years since Gendo manipulated you into causing the Third Impact. The remains of humanity still hate you for it though.

Shinji: So that means I saved Rei, right?

Rei (Black):  You called?

Misato: Shinji, don’t go! Or I’ll activate your shock collar.

Shinji: Wait, does that mean you’ll tell me what’s going on?

Misato: Are you kidding? I don’t even think the writers know what’s going on.

Misato: Fine, here’s your morsel of storytelling: We’re an organization called Wille and we’re dedicated to destroying NERV for no adequately explained reason. Also, Rei doesn’t exist but I refuse to explain what I mean for the sake of this movie’s desultory plot.

Shinji: Man that sounds too stupid even for me. I’ll take my chances with Rei.

Misato: No! I barely have any screen time as it is! Don’t leave! Half-wit!

Mari: BOOM! HEADSHOT!

Rei (Black): You got me! Sike! I had a second health bar.

Mari: What?! No fair! My weapons are useless against ass-pulls!

Ritsuko: Hurry up and put that dog collar to use!

Misato: No, I can’t do it! It turns out that I’m just a spineless wimp after all.

Ritsuko: It’s a good thing I pushed for the sequel option, because there goes our screen time.

NERV

Shinji: I guess I saved Rei after all.

Rei (Black): You keep thinkin’ that.

Shinji: So wait a minute, this is where you’ve taken me for safe keeping? A completely dilapidated, open-aired shell of NERV’s headquarters where, mysteriously, the mile-long escalator down to the basement is the only working mechanism in the entire area? How is it that Wille hasn’t stormed the gates with their newly developed fleet of flying battleships?

Gendo: Shinji, I haven’t seen you in 14 years, but the only thing I want to tell you is that you’ll be participating in my incoherent, louche plan to continue the mass extinction of the human race by piloting this new EVA with the mysterious boy standing behind you. Thanks for letting me push you around. Also, you suck. That is all.

Rei

Shinji: Hey Rei, looks like you’re living in a storage container. Hope you don’t mind me barging in while you’re naked. By the way, you wouldn’t happen to know what went on for the past 14 years, would you? Or how you got out of Unit 01 after I turned into a demi-god?

Rei (Black): …

Shinji: How about books? You like reading books?

Rei (Black): …

Shinji: OK, well I’m going to go sulk for a while.

Piano

Kaworu: Hey Shinji, let’s play the piano together.

Shinji: Who are you?

Kaworu: Someone who loves you.

Shinji: I’ve never played the piano before. Besides, what’s this have to do with the plot?

Kaworu: This is just Mr. Anno’s way of pontificating to the audience that his crap doesn’t stink. We’ve somehow managed to avoid any religious references though.

Shinji: Let’s lie down together and look at the stars. That way no matter what happens, we will be immortalized in endless yaoi slashfics.

Kaworu: After 14 years of waiting, my life finally has meaning. I love you, Shinji!

Revelations

Shinji: Hey, Kaworu. Do you know what happened these past 14 years? This movie’s chatty and pretentious bits are becoming interminable and dull and I’m pretty sure the audience is wondering if this film isn’t actually an elaborate couch trip.

Kaworu: OK, I’ll tell you but don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Audience: Finally!

Kaworu: You caused the near-extinction of mankind 14 years ago. Despite the fact that no one informed you that your tumultuous mental and emotional state while piloting the most powerful weapon on Earth could cause the next apocalypse, all of humanity still holds it against you.

Kaworu: But hey, don’t take it too hard. It only resulted in the death most of humanity, including your friend Taji, whose shirt you’re wearing now. Those who did survive are currently at war with whatever remains of NERV. I’m sure you’ll get over it.

Shinji: Hey, I’m always looking for a new reason to mope and feel sorry for myself.

Shinji: But really, this was all NERV’s fault, right?

Kaworu: No. Well yes. You see, your actions lead to your sins, which you were manipulated into doing. So they’re someone else’s actions and someone else’s sins. But your actions are your own, even though someone else made you do them. But they’re your sins and no sin is unforgivable. Oh look, I don’t know what I’m talking about anymore. Can we go back and play the piano?

Shinji: Can you at least try to explain this in a way we all can understand? Heck, I’ll even take some foreshadowing if sitting down and fleshing out the plot is too much to handle.

Kaworu: Foreshadowing, mmm. Doors of Guf, Lilin, Human Instrumentality Project, Vessel of Adams, Evolution. OK, that’s enough for now.

Shogi

Fuyutsuki: Let’s play shogi. It’ll give me the perfect pretense to foreshadow the rest of the movie.

Shinji: Wow, does that mean this movie actually has a story?

Fuyutsuki: Actually, no. It means it was my job to oversee an experiment where your mother fused with EVA Unit 01 and became a part it’s control system. Also, Rei is a clone of your mother who is also fused with Unit 01.

Gendo: You can thank me for that one.

Shinji: So I initiated an apocalyptic calamity that caused the near-genocide of humanity for the sake of saving my mother’s clone and I didn’t even manage to do that. Wow, I really suck. I’m going to go to the bathroom and wrench about something else.

Fuyutsuki: That’s OK. The good news is everyone in this movie sucks.

Gendo: Except for me, of course. Dance, my puppets, dance! In the meantime, I’m going to putter about and examine this gigantic, decrepit Rei head and do mysterious things.

Breakdown

Shinji: Why aren’t you reading my books, Rei?

Rei (Black): Because you suck.

Shinji: How come you didn’t tell me that you’re my mother’s clone?

Rei (Black):  How am I supposed to know? I’m not even sure why I’m in even in this movie.

Shinji: I guess I’ll have a mental breakdown and lapse into a state of schizophrenia.

Build Up

Gendo: It’s time to pilot Unit 13, my pawns.

Shinji: I don’t wanna. Unit 13 is big and icky.

Kaworu: But Shinji, we can fix all of the world’s problems with the magical relics sitting at the bottom of the pit.

Shinji: How are we supposed to do that?

Kaworu: Through flagrant abuse of Kabbalistic symbolism.

Shinji: Your ostensible substitutes for an actual storyline and character depth are no match for my petulant angst!

Kaworu:  Alright, how about this: I’ll take off your dog collar and put it on myself. Will you stop sucking then?

Shinji: Wait, why don’t you just throw it in the garbage?

Kaworu:  So Mr. Anno can thoroughly crush your soul later.

Shinji: Deal!

Fourth Impact

Misato: Through means we haven’t explained, I’ve detected another EVA unit.

Ritsuko: Wait a minute, if we can detect the DSS Choker from here, why don’t we just detonate it now and prevent the next Armageddon?

Misato: Fool! Logic has no place in this movie.

Shinji: Rei, you suck.

Shinji: Interesting Christmas decorations you got here.

Kaworu: Oh, don’t worry about those red EVAs in the walls. Those are just failed attempts to turn the people of Tokyo-3 into Gods during the Third Impact. Ya know, the one you caused.

Shinji: At last, that incomprehensible “piano” subplot has come to fruition and it has somehow allowed us to penetrate this large religious seal at the bottom of Terminal Dogma.

Shinji: OK, those are the spears. Let’s grab ‘em and go home.

Kaworu: Hang on, something doesn’t make sense.

Shinji: Huh? What are you talking about? Which part doesn’t make sense? The tenuous purpose of our current situation? The fact that your character’s motives have been left completely unexplained for the past two movies? The fact that you can breathe and talk in space? Or your explanation of what happened 14 years ago, which was overwrought with incomprehensible jargon that forced everyone to read the Eva Wiki?

Kaworu: No, dummy. I’m talking about the spears. Pulling them out may do something bad, but I refuse to elucidate any further for fear of ending the movie prematurely.

Asuka: On that note, I better pop up out of nowhere before the credits roll.

Asuka: Shinji, you suck. Go home, you’re drunk. Don’t pull out those spears.

Shinji: Does anyone in this movie actually want to tell me what would happen if I pull them out? Kaworu, how about you? What’s going on here?

Kaworu: Oh, I’m sorry Shinji. I’m quite lost in reverie while you take on the forces of Wille all by yourself. I’m going to meekly stand idle and watch you end the world again.

Shinji: If nobody is going to take those spears out, then I will.

Rei (Black): Uh oh, ever since the second movie everyone has forgotten that I exist. Hey Shinji, need a hand with the apocalypse?

Gendo: Ahh, and the pawns initiate the Fourth Impact, right on schedule.

Kaworu: Gosh, I totally mistook the plan of an evil madman hell-bent on human genocide for one of world restoration and prosperity. Color me embarrassed.

SEELE’s Last Words

Gendo: I’ve done away with your plan, SEELE. No hard feelings.

SEELE: That’s all right. Besides, I think we’re way beyond the point of trying to fool the audience into thinking there’s actually a comprehensible story behind all of this.

Gendo: Good point. Now die.

Once More

Shinji: Well, I guess I can’t feign ignorance this time.

Rei (Black): Hey, Shinji, remember how you were saying that I suck? Well, actually, you suck!

Kaworu: This is, probably, partially my fault. If I hadn’t been in a state of torpor and muted this entire time all of this could’ve been avoided.

Shinji: Don’t be so hard on yourself. This movie’s only real talent is its ability to put the audience to sleep.

Misato: And I’m now screaming valiantly in an effort to stop the Fourth Impact.

Rei (Black): Bah! My machine is going berserk and kicking your flying butt.

Asuka: Well, I don’t think weed whacking the ground with the wings of Wunder is a good thing. I’ll take care of that. Mari, you go save the world.

Mari: Wait, I’m actually still in this movie?

Asuka: Even though kamikaze style attacks never worked before, we’re going to try it now.

Ritsuko: We’ve somehow managed to improbably survive a massive explosion that occurred a mere few hundred meters from us while on rickety airship. Who writes this crap?

Combustion

Shinji: So, what are we gonna do now, Kaworu?

Kaworu: Well, I’ll start by spouting New Age dribble meant to bamboozle you and the audience.

Shinji: I’m pretty sure the movie has become completely incomprehensible at this point. There’s no need to continue inflicting your convoluted pseudo-philosophical jargon upon the audience. Besides, you’re just making this up as you go along, right?

Kaworu: Curses. Well, the jig’s up. In that case, remember how I mentioned that thing about completely crushing your soul?

Shinji: Oh, you mean when you took my dog colla—

Kaworu: *ASSPLODE*

Shinji: Oh God! OK, you win. This would be a good time to slip into a state of listless gloom.

Mari: That’s my cue to save the world! Shinji, you suck!

Ritsuko: Well that was inexplicably fortunate. Instead of questioning what really happened there, let’s just get the hell out of here.

Review

Gendo: Why yes, this is the third time I’ve manipulated events behind the scenes. SEELE has now been completely removed from the picture and we’ve awakened Unit 13.

Fuyutsuki: Was there any point to any of this wanton destruction? We haven’t even fully explained the purpose behind the “Vessel of Adams” or the Second Impact.

Gendo: That’s the point! This is Mr. Anno’s way of denigrating the audience into feeling like Shinji: abused, flummoxed, and entirely impertinent to the suffering Mr. Anno went through to make these remakes in light of the infamous “Congratulations” scene. It’s like the creator is validating his own obnoxiousness.

Ending

Asuka: Shinji, you suck! Why didn’t you try to help me? And don’t think that I’ll accept the world denouncing your existence, watching the only person who loved you explode into gumbo-guts, and me trying to kill you as an excuse to curl up into a ball and lethargically lay there like some sap.

Shinji: That’s odd, you kicking me doesn’t give me any more reason to care.

Rei (Black): Well this movie made no sense. Despite the fact that there was absolutely no closure or story progression, do you think Mr. Anno is going to have a proper plot ending in the next movie?

Gendo: Whoa, hang on! Who said anything about a plot? You should know better by now than to expect anything from Evangelion.

Misato: At least there’ll be fanservice!

Audience: ARGH!!

End of Janruary/February 2013 Report

Overview

Well, we’re slowly making our way through all of the anime we need to encode. Strike is actually on the last episode of Oretachi and I’m gearing up for the last 5 episodes of Gundam 00 S2. The next release release will be the batch in both cases.

In other news, we paid our bills. Since we’ve discontinued taking donations, we’re going to be migrating to a cheaper seedbox. That means that for the next 3 days or so, all seeds are going to be broken while I transfer shit.

Other than that, nothing else is new. We haven’t died and we plan on sticking around for a long time.

De-wah.

Gundam 00 S2 16-20

OMG

We posted something.

1080p Torrent
720p Torrent

P.S. End of the month report incoming.