Best of 765+876=!!

On Friday 9th July I received something quite special to me.
This is possibly my last audio CD purchase for THE iDOLM@STER series as it was. From now on I’ll prolly only be getting the 2nd Vision line of stuff, which started off with the release of Dearly Stars on the NDS.

Also for those that may not know, THE iDOLM@STER 2 has been announced with a trailer for those to see how the idols have grown over the past year in their world. It also features a new song titled “The World Is All One!!”. You can download the video from the 4Gamer site in GLORIOUS 60FPS 720p video.

Anyway, here some pics of the whole set for those of the curious mind:

With the contents, the book contains covers of the CD/DVD/Blu-Ray releases, with track listings and other details, AND lyrics for everysong AAAANNDD what CDs they appear in @_@

I wonder, I prolly should take a massive photoshoot of all my iM@S merchandise and calculate how much of a consumer whore I am… ^^;

Anti-wallet express

Goodies from Japan

I managed to squeeze some time to actually do a proper post. Long story short, I’m bogged down with work, uni work and sick family members >.<

So, this package was actually received on the 28th of last month and I didn’t had time to update on the day =/

So, as you can see above, the contents of the box from my friend, Hectic. The other box was from Hobby Link Japan, and it contained clothes for Evelyn, more on that in another post :P

Famitsu Xbox360

Famitsu (ファミ通) has been around for a loooooooong time, and as such, is one of the more respected series of game magazines in Japan. This is their Xbox360 line of magazines and this issue has a feature on iM@S Live For You! :3 It comes with two booklets of games I don’t have much interest in, and a poster of iM@S Live For You!!

Gemaga

Gemaga (ゲーマガ) is a general game magazine rather than focusing on one system. This issue it also features iM@S Live For You! and includes a pencilboard of iM@S and a standard issue DVD, which happens to feature the iM@S Live For You! Trailer, exclusive interview/radio show with Azusa and Chihaya’s voice actors, and the standard package of the latest trailers from across the world… most in Japanese tho XD

Dengeki Moeoh

Unlike the others, Dengeki Moeoh (電撃萌王) is really about the artists. There’s usually only two reasons why I would buy a Dengeki Moeoh, one is that Komatsu Eeji is featured, or there’s special goodies. This issue it had special goodies XD This time last year, Dengeki Moeoh gave out a year long calender featuring scantly clad girls (or completely naked) with bands of colour with the dates of the month across certain erogenous zones XD Well, this year they released another since the previous one has expired.

The calendar is just absolutely drool inducing, I salivate at the thought of seeing the next month image when it’s near the end of the month!

POP Wonderland: Cinderella

Remember that old post about childrens’ books? Well, there’s been a new addition to the series, Cinderella. POP has done another great series of illustrations for Cinderella, and the book is also the same great quality. Just a reminder that this is an excellent book for easy Japanese reading as it also contains furigana, and gives you an excuse to buy some loli merchandise XD

Moeyo! Ground self-defence force school

This is a series of educational books from publisher Ikaros. The artist for Moeyo! Ground self-defence force school (萌えよ！陸自学校) is Takeshi Nogami, who happens to also draw some nice H manga XD
The book is choc-a-block full of info on the ground self-defence force, from it’s tactics to the equipment used. A must have for any otaku who happens to be a military nut as well, though knowledge of Japanese is a must if you wish to truly appreciate this book (which I lack ^^; hehe)

Random manga

Also by Takeshi Nogami, a manga about chicks and tanks, not much to say other than it’s fairly heavy on tanks and scantly clad girls driving them.

iM@S: MASTER LIVE 00 Shiny Smile

Arg, a new line of CDs by iM@S, my wallet is crying in anguish! This first one features Shiny Smile, and also includes a bonus DVD with footage of the performances. A must have for any iM@S fan.

iM@S: MASTER LIVE 01 REM@STER A

This next CD features most of the remix A type of the songs which are available in iM@S: Live For You! Some are ok, some aren’t. My particular favourite is Ohayo! Asa Gohan (おはよう！！朝ご飯) as it’s turned into some sort of mega hyper sort of thing XD Recommended to any iM@S fan :3

3500 Microsoft Points: iM@S:L4U! LE Card A

My point pot is getting low….damn iM@S planes in AC6. So I decided to rectify this by purchasing a point card, and it so happens that they have iM@S limited edition ones for sale :3

Prism Ark Tsundere Dakimakura

Now, I already have a hug pillow, Kenshin from Sengoku Rance, but this is the first one I’ve bought by itself. Prism Ark is a H game that has some gorgeous moe art. It also has an anime, which I haven’t watched @_@ As you can see, the pillow cover features two sides of Priecia, being quite delectable, especially with her facial expressions which just makes me want to do awful things to the pillow…^^; This is a HobbyStock exclusive as well.

So that’s the overview of the recent package I received, I’m quite busy lately so I won’t be able to update for the next week or so I think. I’ll try my best since I have a few things I’d like to share with you guys :3 Look forward to it!

Moéblobs

Isn’t it sad Haku ;_;

There are some things which I just can’t stay quiet about, I try to not post random anime things here that isn’t really relevant to what my blog is about, so I refrain from post youtubes and the like.

BUT THIS IS AN EXCEPTION!

This is something so incredibly moé that I died. And it is for that reason why this post is being, well…posted

Ok, this post will deal with two things, first off is the Vocaloid2 Yowane Haku (弱音ハク)

Here’s a description of Haku…source unknown:
“Yowane Haku (弱音ハク) – Her name means “Speaking weak words” (‘Speaking’ here has connotation of a pent up sigh or muttering). She gets her start from a thread in 2chan where a user commented “I bought Hatsune Miku for her cute looks but no matter how hard I try, I can’t get anything better than mechanical sounding songs out of her.”

An artist took this and ran with it to create Yowane Haku, an alter ego of all unskilled users of Hatsune Miku. Haku is a sad Vocaloid who just can’t sing as well as Miku. She is always crying because of her frustration and vents her frustration by drinking. Her image colors are silver and purple. Her character item is a sake bottle.”

Makes me want to go up to her and cuddle up, then share a drink lol. I must have some sort of weird complex for girls like this, which could be a bad thing for me =/

If you’re interested in Haku’s (lack of) singing ability, just do a search in YouTube, you’ll find her…
There’s another fanmade creation of Miku, Neru. I don’t know much of her but she dispises otaku, and refuses to sing and dance properly to spite the viewers. She has one ponytail to her left, yellow hair and black clothes with yellow trims. I’ll have to read up more on her as I’m not even sure if that’s accurate.

Second thing I needed to get off my chest is this:

*dies*

Happy New Year!

Postal Goodies

I’m part Vietnamese (the other being Thai/Chinese…) so I tend to associate the lunar new year as a Vietnamese custom rather than Chinese.
Anyway, yesterday I went down to the post office to pick up some goodies!

As you can already see, my Shuraki box #2 finally arrived, that’s a shocking 2 months or so of wait… -_-;
This was purchased over at Kid Nemo Company. After a month, I emailed them to see what was the delay about, apparently there was a mix up or something… -_-;
I wouldn’t of known if I didn’t go and ask them myself, so I was a lil annoyed. Shipping and handling was also a lil steep since this was an American company, having the figure sent from Japan, to them, then to me in Australia… However, if you do happen to live in America, Kid Nemo might be a great option as they do update their products fairly fast, usually faster than HLJ from what I’ve seen.

So here’s my beloved MeiFeng, a figure I’ve been longing to get. I must say tho, I find myself getting Shuraki figures because of 3 main reasons, in order:

• Their hair, Drill Hair~!
• Weapons
• Facial expression, grrrr~!

Oh god, I LOVE MeiFeng, EVERYTHING, her unusual hair colour and style, china dress and that “ribbon” on her leg, her weapons and her general pose and “attitude” and HER LEGS~! No battle damage photo, same deal with Char, you’ll see it when I do a photo shoot :3

Next up are doujins and magazines which I received from my good friend Hectic3, without him I’d be… more rich… orz

Megami Creators, some of you may know it from a previous post. This is Volume 10 of the series and it has some very nice artists being presented, such as Kei who happens to have done the art for Crypton’s Vocaloid2 series.

This issue comes with a huge B2 sized poster, double sided, one of what you see on the front cover, and the other is an illustration by KOMATSU EEJI~! featuring Noriko, Asuka, Nia and Yoko as Mecha Musume as Gunbuster, EVA-02, Gurren and that thing that Yoko sits on…respectively.

YOU WA SHOOOOCK~!!! Some of you may recognise the artist from another previous post featuring the iDOLM@STER girls. Now it’s Vocaloid2’s turn :3 I assure you, it is hilarious XD

Next up is a Touhou doujin “Another day comes” by Claps Cat, non-H, and it’s something about Marisa having catears (instant win) and she wants it off…Alice gives her a kiss and POOF, they disappear, Marisa then proceeds to run away~

Another Touhou doujin, this time by HappyBirthday. The cover is really really nice :3 The background has a holographic sheen to it. It also comes with an A4 oversized poster :3 This is also non-H, I can’t really tell what’s the story about, but it looks like a simple happy-go-lucky type one~

Now, I also received the long overdue iDOLM@STER Christmas for you! soundtrack, yes, I know it is now February, blame Hectic3 (I did mention I love you right? ^^;)

I haven’t had the time to listen to it yet, as I’ve been busy (in fact I just ripped it while I was typing this post) so I can’t really give a review, but what I can give is an opinion on the art:

So with that, Happy New Year!

Unfortunately I don’t know who drew that so I can’t link back =/
btw, I was born in the year of the Tiger, two more years to wait! rawr! >:3

Today’s package

Char Rhousemann

Just a small post today… again.

Char Rhousemann graces my room with her elegant yet firm presence~

Went to pick up a package today, it was my first ever post from Hobby Search.
For those who havn’t shopped from them before, they’re pretty decent. Perhaps a lil expensive in terms of shipping, since they only have EMS option for international orders. However, they are fast in their product listings, so if you have an item you MUST have pre-ordered ASAP, then this might be a good choice since HLJ is a lil slow in that area.

As you can see (please excuse my room…) and prolly already know if you’re into figures, is that the Shuraki line of series come with a small booklet and a drama CD, both focusing on the character of the box.

Char also comes with some battle damaged (ripped :3) clothing, but you’ll have to wait till a photo shoot before seeing that. Also, it’s a bloody PAIN to undress and dress her up, rubbing painted plastics together is not a thing I’d like to do with my figures. Anyway, I have a few ideas in mind on where to take photos of her around here, so look forward to it!

VOCALOID2 CV2

Kagamine Rin & Len

As some of you may know, Crypton’s Vocaloid2 CV2 Kagamine Rin & Len was released yesterday! For those of you who don’t know what a Vocaloid is, you can find out a lil about it from a previous post.

This is a unique Vocaloid in taht it has both male and female vocals, from the same source seiyuu.

If you want some pictures of Rin then read on!

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Details

Name
鏡音リン&レン – Kagamine Rin & Len
Series
キャラクター ボーカル シリーズ – Character Vocal series
Maker
Crypton
Price
Open Price, but recommended at 15,750 yen
Links
Crypton’s Official Vocaloid2 site JP
Akiba blog’s first entry JP
Akiba blog’s second entry JP

I haven’t purchased this one as of yet due to my budget, but maybe one day~…

Gomae!

New iDOLM@STER

Short post, but important one, THE iDOLM@STER IS GETTING ANOTHER GAME!
Xbox360 users (who like iDOLM@STER) will be delighted about the new game coming out.

I’ve only heard about this through a friend (Hectic) last night. I managed to find a few Famitsu scans of it from gamersyde.com, cheers to them.

Apparently from reading the comments, it seems like the game will focus more on the actual idol performance rather than the idol raising aspect, which is all good in my opinion :3 (partly due to the fact that I don’t understand 100% of the dialogue in the raising aspect anyway ^^;) It will also have a DVD with some animation (not sure what this means) and also a remix soundtrack CD.

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I can’t wait to get my hands on this :3

Hatsune Miku

Akatsuki no Kuruma

After a week of fiddling around and playing with Miku I managed to get this piece done.
It was quite difficult for me since I havn’t had any musical training since…2003? And even then I wasn’t that great ^^;
It also doesn’t help that my Japanese isn’t all that good either~

I’m not sure if I’ll be doing any other Miku renditions of songs, but who knows, enjoy this one XD

So I did two versions, one with just Hatsune Miku, and another with her and the original singer FictionJunction YUUKA.

Miku Solo version:

MP3: here

Duet version:

MP3: here

I had quite a bit of trouble figuring out how to use all the properties of Miku’s voice, and I know I still got a lot to explore. I don’t really see myself doing this all the time but it sure was fun trying different things… like making her say onii-chan :3

The image of Miku in the video was made to look similar to the original cover by FictionJunction YUUKA

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The actual drawing of Miku tho was done by かぐらゆうき (Kagura Yuki) who happened to be the one that also drew Yayoi on the top headers you see.

Anyway, Miku’s voice was obviously done in VOCALOID2, the mixing was done in Adobe Audition 2.0, imagery was done in Adobe Photoshop CS3, video in Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 and encoding by VirtualDub.

Details

Name
初音ミク – Hatsune Miku
Series
キャラクター ボーカル シリーズ – Character Vocal series
Maker
Crypton
Retail Price
15,750 yen
Bought it for
15,750 yen OTL
Links
Crypton’s Official Vocaloid2 site JP
Hatsune Miku tumblr JP (Contains some NSFW material)
THE VOC@LOiD M@STER Event JP
Hobby Blog’s Hatsune Miku entry ENG
Canned Dogs’ Hatsune Miku entry ENG
Neko Nyan Liberation – Hakurei Shrine’s Hatsune Miku entry ENG
twinscatear – Kagura Yuki’s site JP

Moé Idolatry Article

Hatsune Miku

Infatuation, something that happens to everyone, but with a virtual “identity” is something that doesn’t.
I’m not sure if this is relevant to any of you figure lovers but I’m in love with Crypton’s newest entry, Hatsune Miku.

Before I start, I’m going to explain a little bit about what all this about. So if you’re not into music then just look at the pretty pictures XD

Vocaloid is a technology developed by Yamaha systems, it produces a synthetic voice set that sounds pretty awesome in itself. Third party companies have used this technology to bring it to the consumer market and packaged them with their own voices. Crypton is one of these companies, they produce these packages for the Japanese market. They’ve developed a few for the Vocaloid 1 series but their popularity isn’t so prominent with the anime otaku, until of course they released the Vocaloid2 series, with Hatsune Miku as the first.

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Because they’re synthesized voices, you can tell it’s fake depending on effort of the producer, but for the most part Miku sings amazing (if you like Japanese pop). She’s so popular that apparently all the first prints of the Vocaloid2 Hatsune Miku package have sold out, and it has also made amazon’s #1 bestsellers software rank despite the 15,750 yen price (which I’m still wondering if I should buy…)

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Okok, so why am I posting about something that doesn’t seem to fit? Well, this site includes moé items and issues, as you can already see, Hatsune Miku is incredibly cute (ok, I admit I have a weird hair fetish) and there’s quite a few fanart of her already.

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The kanji for Hatsune apparently means The first voice or something according to a friend of mine, which makes sense I guess, she is the first of the Crypton Vocaloid2 series, a second is going to be announced in December and a third is going to be in 2008. The second seems to be a younger idol from the silhouette so expect more moé-ness.

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I’m in no way a musically creative person so actually owning Hatsune Miku (huhu, i like the way it sounds…) is somewhat a waste. I’ve tried the software and while it does seem like an easy thing to pick up, not knowing extensive Japanese is a hassle. *sigh* Sometimes I wish I was living in Japan lol

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Anyway, ever since Hatsune Miku appeared, niconico video (think youtube but for Japanese and it also allows rolling comments over the videos) has had it’s fair share of user created videos featuring Miku singing originals and also other songs such as you from Higurashi no Naku Koroni and even Ievan Polkka. There’s so much of a fan base that on November 3rd there’s going to be a Hatsune Miku Vocaloid only event!

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So, here’s a few of my favourite Miku videos from YouTube :3

Ievan Polkka

鳥の詩 – AIR

you – Higurashi no Naku Koroni

Beautiful World – Rebuild of Evangelion

Here’s some official sample songs from the official site, short and sweet songs.

Song 1
Song 2
Song 3

*sigh* I’m in love… so ronery~!!

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Details

Name
初音ミク – Hatsune Miku
Series
キャラクター ボーカル シリーズ – Character Vocal series
Maker
Crypton
Price
Open Price, but seen at 15,750 yen
Links
Crypton’s Official Vocaloid2 site JP
Hatsune Miku tumblr JP (Contains some NSFW material)
THE VOC@LOiD M@STER Event JP
Hobby Blog’s Hatsune Miku entry ENG
Canned Dogs’ Hatsune Miku entry ENG

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P.S. I’ve taken photos of most of the figures I intended to at Manifest over the weekend, I’ll post those photo shoots soonish, after I get some other work out of the way >.<
So expect Saber & Irisviel, Pachira, N@gi (GSC), Princess of Full Ani, and Fate (Alter) :3

eminence

Destiny Reunion

Okies, short post, BECAUSE I FORGOT TO TAKE PICTURES~! >8(
I can’t believe I forgot to take pictures…which goes to show how fun it was. For those who don’t know, Destiny Reunion is a concert by eminence. They specialise in anime and video game music orchestral performances and do tours all over the world. They are the premier symphonic musicians of today.

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Now, I prolly should of wrote about this earlier but with most of their performances, they don’t give out the full score list so I didn’t really pay much attention. Destiny Reunion was awesome, it had a great line up but what I was most surprised about was ODIN SPHERE, O-D-I-N S-P-H-E-R-E!! The moment I saw that on the score list at the seats, I had to change to a new set of pants. Oh god that was euphoric…

Again, I’m sorry for the lack of photos, it didn’t occur to me at all during my orgasmic fit @_@ so for those who doubt that I even went, here’s proof:

So if any of you get the chance to see their performances, and you appreciate music, go and see them, seriously. :3

Details

Name
eminence
Performance
Destiny Reunion
Performance Time
7:00pm – 9:30pm 11th August
Location
BMW Edge @ Federation Square
Ticket price
A-Reserve – $50 AU