So as to not look so empty.

[theguindo]

Yeah mostly I'm gonna use this thing to comment on other people's entries. I'm still pretty stuck on my livejournal, so all my actual updating happens there.

[EDIT FOUR YEARS LATER] ACTUALLY I JUST DON'T USE MY PERSONAL JOURNAL AT ALL ANYMORE SO WHATEVER

Comments

[zweihander]

Man, bro, you are the least creative

[theguindo]

lmao I just like to have the same main name everywhere. makes me easy to find.

[zweihander]

This is precisely why I change my name wherever I go.

[theguindo]

It's okay not everyone can be as cool as I am, some people have to suffer.

[zweihander]

Yeah bro it totally sucks to have potential employers be able to find everything about my online habits so easily

[theguindo]

Man dude don't even, I totally learned that lesson the hard way already. Why you think my LJ is friends-mostly?

[zweihander]

I never really questioned it. Maaaan.

[theguindo]

Fun fact: the army doesn't like it when you talk about what you do when you cut yourself off from the rest of your life for two days every month to go work for them.

[zweihander]

Oh shit I forgot for a second that your employer was the army. So I'll just be over here making a complete ass of myself.

[theguindo]

8D

Yeah I got my clearance revoked (locally, not officially) and had to put together a brief on personal blog security and brief it to the rest of the unit. FUN TIMES.

I mean it was a bitch but it could've been a lot worse. They were really lenient because I didn't actually share any classified information (some coworker names, and a bit about how the facility worked) and there was no SOP on that sort of thing. ie young soldiers were NOT AWARE of the Do's and Do Not's of personal blog security. SO I MEAN. Yeah it sucked but at least they didn't totally fuck me over for it, they just decided they needed to implement an education program about it and decided I was going to be in charge of that. (this is how the army works: if you fuck up, you get to teach everyone else how not to fuck up like you did)

[zweihander]

Any comment I could post would boil down to a less sarcastic "cool story, bro" so I will just say cool story, bro, and assure you that it is meant with sincerity.

[theguindo]

XD

yeah good times.

[elanor_pam]

So, it seems you have Violinist of Hameln among your interests, and I kinda need other VoH fans to squee with, so...

Have you read the sequel? :D;

[theguindo]

I have fallen very behind on it I think (only up to ch 27), but I have read it!

I've seen you around the VoH LJ community =O

[elanor_pam]

It's only been scanlated up to chapter 33, so, really, the one who's fallen behind is the scanlator (coughmecough).

It's just that I like reading what people say/write about the series, but, for some reason, no one seems interested in writing about VoH. Not even fanfiction. I miss good Hameln fanfiction. This lack of discussion (even in the comm!) makes me feel shy about writing my own thoughts, all the more because the Hameln fans in my LJ f-list don't seem to want to read the sequel out of some purist thing. I'm pretty sure I read some stuff in your lj, though, and when I searched the interests here on dw I saw your name and thought about dropping a line.

So basically, I was feeling like a lonely fan and saw your dw journal and pounced on it. I feel a bit silly now.

[theguindo]

I don't write fanfiction really >___> but I did write an essay on the VoH setting once. I RPed Raiel at Daisychain and MAN did I think way too friggin' hard about the world setting.

I love discussing the series, actually. There's a lot of untapped depth to it if you really start thinking about what's going on.

Anyway don't feel silly => it's always nice to talk to fellow VoH fans.

[elanor_pam]

Didn't expect you to XD but I see so many good writers whose interests would align so well with the VoH world that it really frustrates me that they never give it a chance and... well.

I'd love to read that essay, though. Thinking hard about a setting or a story is something I'm much better at doing than fic writing, but I'm not that good at putting my thoughts down - having someone to bounce ideas off of really helps me organize my mind. And with Shchelkunchik in the equation, the VoH world is getting much bigger, and the politics of all those countries are suddenly coming into play. I'm so close to the really juicy parts in Shchelkunchik that it makes me wish I could scanlate with my mind. XD

Ooh, RP 8D I was part of the AIM RPG for years and really miss the crowd. I only did lj RPing a couple times, though, and it didn't quite work - I think the setting was too... I dunno, it was kind of slow. No real goal to work towards, no plot. I keep meaning to find other settings, but I don't know how I'd fare in them, and don't want to get into something just to fade out of it.

[theguindo]

The essay is here if you'd like to read it. (I tend to take a very dark interpretation of the goings-on in VoH; it lends itself to it despite its frequent comedy.)

I've been reading Schelkunchik but so far it seems like Watanabe's trying a little too hard to emulate his VoH style humour instead of letting the new story come into its own. I imagine it'll get better as the story progresses and finds its niche, but it's kept me from getting all excited and scrambling to read chapters as soon as they come out like I did with VoH.

LJRP has a massive problem with game inertia 8( It takes ages for anything to happen and when it does it feels meaningless because it doesn't seem to actually change anything. It's a big issue I have with fandom games, really.

[elanor_pam]

Yes, that is a problem with the first volumes of Shchelkunchik, but it really does come into his own, hard. It's actually right around chapter 27 that the shift starts happening, along with Great's role shift - he stops being merely "the Hamel" and starts feeling like something completely new. Chapter 29 shows more of that (it's also hilarious). And chapter 30 starts a flashback to Shchel's recent past which explains A LOT about him.

I find it telling that, in the first 2 volumes, we get the expected characters in their expected roles - Hamel's son is the new "Hamel", the new character who befriended him is at times the "Raiel" and at times the "Flute", and his older brother is "Oboe"-ish. All of that culminates in a re-enacting of the climatic scene in vol. 15 from the first series... and right afterwards it veers off, with a completely unknown enemy jumping out to steal his blood and Clari showing up like he knew it was going to happen all along. After that, Great is accepted, his arc seems resolved, and we start on Shchel's problems and the mystery with his body (It's not clear on the bw pages, but he's actually always covered from neck to toe).

And it turns out I haven't actually finished chapter 33, so only chapter 32 has been uploaded so far. XD;; I swear I'll have it done until tomorrow. It starts an utterly awesome arc with tons of character development, so I'm looking forward to what you'll think of it and the ones following it :D

Yes, that sounds like what I felt from the one game I was part of... except it was actually a multiverse-lounge type of RP, which I guess exarcebates the problem. No final boss/destination to look forward to, no driving issues, just... having characters from fandoms I never heard about sit and chat. It was not my cup of tea.

[theguindo]

Oooh sounds like I'll need to go catch up then. I definitely think the story has promise and I've just been waiting for Watanabe to do something with his concept.

lol yeah 8( jamjars with no plot. It's hard to find games with a plot these days but there are some out there. Daisychain was one of them, but it had other problems. I had fun there, though, and we had a fairly sizable VoH cast. Hamel, Raiel, Flute, Clari, and Lute - though the latter two got dropped before the game ended.

[elanor_pam]

I'd love to hear your thoughts once you do. I'm really impressed with Great's character development, and it gets better from now on. I feel kinda like I'm spoiling things, but... he's not just Hamel's kid, and it shows. Boy, does it show.

The AIM RPG was very good in terms of plot and action - it was, after all, a real-time chatroom, and reading the logs was a lot easier than shifting through threads in LJ, but getting everyone to gather at the right time was a pain, and the time zones didn't help when you have time zones ranging from California to Rio de Janeiro. And since most everyone only had time on sunday night, those who lived farther east and had to wake up early only got to play for a couple of hours... hours in which most everyone else hadn't arrived yet. :( I think these discrepancies are what killed the RPG, little by little. We lasted long, though, and had an awesome plot.