I’ve been fighting off a nasty cold for most of the week, so no blog entry today. Next Friday, hopefully!

***9/2/2011 UPDATE*** Feeling better, but decided to give myself another week off, so I can spend the time preparing for my lessons which will start on Wednesday. Hopefully I’ll have time to put up a new blog entry next week!

***9/9/2011 UPDATE*** Just in case anyone out there is waiting with bated breath for a new entry, I should be able to get to it this weekend. It will not be worth the wait. :-/

Retro Game Master Homepage

As I confessed in a previous entry, I enjoy watching people play video games. I don’t know if it’s because it evokes nostalgic memories of passing around the NES controller at sleepovers, or maybe I enjoy it for the same reason that normal people enjoy watching sports. Whatever the reason, I’ve spent countless hours watching YouTube videos of complete strangers documenting their video game playthroughs.

When I first started watching them, I remember thinking that this form of entertainment couldn’t exist without the internet. It was to too weird and niche; I figured it just didn’t have enough commercial potential to warrant mainstream production/distribution.

As it turns out, I was wrong. In 2003, Fuji TV introduced a show called Game Center CX in Japan. During its first season, GCCX resembled any old video game show, with developer interviews and game previews taking center stage.

Beginning with the second season, the focus changed, and the show began to center around the host’s attempts to beat classic video games, from start to finish, in just a day (or occasionally, two or three days). The funny thing is, the host, Japanese comedian Shinya Arino, kind of sucks at games. He’s just so cute and good-natured you can’t help but cheer him on. I’ve been a fan of the show since I first discovered it five years ago.

I’ve always wanted to recommend the show to my video game loving friends in the States, but since it was in Japanese I always abstained. So I’m pleased to announce that the video game website Kotaku has started running episodes of the show with subtitles (and a somewhat irritating dubbed in English announcer). So check it out!

Retro Game Master Homepage

My favorite episode that they’ve run so far: Solomon’s Key

By the time this goes up, I’ll be on my way to Japan (or possibly in Japan, depending on when you read it). Pretty exciting!

I’ve prepared four entries to automatically go up every Friday for the next four weeks, because I’m sure I’ll be too busy to devote any time to the blog shortly after I arrive. After that, I’ll probably resume timely updates, including entries about my new surroundings.

Well, I’ve still got preparations to tend to, so I’ll leave it at this for now. Stay tuned!

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Note: Since I’m in Japan, I’ll no longer be able to offer inscribed copies of my books. However, I signed a few copies of each book before I left (about ten copies of each), so you can still get a signed copy from my store. “While supplies last” and all that!

Via Neatorama

If you’ve read this entry, then you know that I’ve been lucky enough to be accepted to participate in the JET Program for a second time. I have just a month until I board that plane, and have a lot of preparations left to do… my departure has sort of snuck up on me. I have to admit it hasn’t completely sunk in yet.

One thing that’s helped to make the experience seem more real is I just found out where in Japan I’m going to be. I’m about 30-60min outside of Kyoto. I still don’t know exactly where I’ll be or what age groups I’ll be teaching, I gotta say I couldn’t be more delighted with the location. So for all your people who offered to buy me a beer, know that I’m coming to collect!

Oh, one more thing related to my departure: if anyone’s interested in getting a signed/inscribed copy of Tonoharu from me, place those orders now! Once I leave the US I won’t be able to do them for obvious reasons.

More updates to follow in the coming weeks!

Okay, this is totally outside the scope of this blog, but I couldn’t think of anything to write this week, so…

Here’s my list (in no particular order). All games are for PC or browser:

1. Redder — Play Online
A Metroid-type game with a shocking twist!

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2. HeroCore – Download
A tough-as-nails retro shooter! Even on “Normal” mode this game is super hard, and on “Hard” mode it’s impossible. But I beat it somehow. Are you up for the challenge???

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3. VVVVVV – Play Demo Online — Buy Full Game for $5
Awesome gravity-flipping action! This is the only game on the list that isn’t actually freeware; the two-level demo is free, the whole game will set you back five big ones. But it’s worth it!

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4. L’Abbaye des Morts – Download
Finally: a game that lets you play as a 13th Century French monk! Awesome Spectrum ZX-style graphics in this fun little platformer.

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5. Guardian of Paradise — Download
Neat little Zelda-style game. It’s pretty easy, but still fun.

My friend Ted Anderson is a huge fan of the new My Little Ponies series, a show I wouldn’t even know existed were it not for his tireless efforts to spread the My Little Pony gospel.

I still haven’t seen it yet so I’ll reserve comment on that, but there is a Japanese children’s cartoon that I really love called Oden-kun. The first episode heads this entry.

It’s not one of those ironic, winking-at-the-adults shows; instead, it’s sweet and earnest. (Although the super-long intro in this episode is weirdly dark.)  Oden-kun just has a quality to it that always makes me smile, and I’ve met other adults in Japan that felt the same way. I suppose in that sense it possesses that rare quality that Peanuts has, in that it could be enjoyed by nine year old girls or 34 year old cartoonists.

English subtitles are available by pressing the “CC” button. Enjoy!

Just a Youtube video of a couple guys playing a Vietnamese bootleg of a Pokemon game. I “LOL”ed.

Via Mr. Bryan Roberts

*Reminder* Until the end of this month (i.e., for the next seven days), I’m donating the profits from Paypal sales of Tonoharu: Part One and Two to the Red Cross, to help with the earthquake and tsunami relief in Japan. (Details here)

So far I’ve sold five books, with a total of $77.50 donated to the Red Cross (my thanks to those who ordered!). I think it’d be cool to get that total up to at least $100, so if you’ve always wanted a copy of Tonoharu, please consider making that purchase now! Otherwise, please consider donating directly to the charity of your choice. Thanks!

Living in a foreign country is a premise that is ripe with dramatic & comedic potential. Many prose books have tackled the subject, but not so much in the realm of visual narrative (i.e. movies, tv shows, and comics). One of the reasons I created my graphic novel series Tonoharu was to try to fill this baffling gap. I’ve never understood why there are dozens of mediocre medical dramas and cop shows on tv, but not really any that depict the unique & exciting experience of life abroad.

A notable exception debuted late last year, in the form of the web series entitled English Teachers. Each of the eight episodes is about seven minutes long, so the whole run can be watched in less than an hour.

I have mixed feelings about the show. For one, the characters are written a little too broadly for my tastes. Also, the stories feel a bit rushed; they try to cram in standard sitcom plots into a third the running time, so conflicts are often introduced only to be immediately, unsatisfyingly resolved in the next scene.

But hey, it often takes a while for a show to hit its stride. And overall, I like English Teachers, and think it has potential. The casting and acting are good, as are the production values. And while there are aspects of the writing that frustrate me, I have to admit I want to keep watching. Here’s hoping the series is popular enough to warrant a second season.

Official Site: http://englishteachersseries.com
YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/englishseries

(Thanks to Adam Pasion for introducing me to the series)

I’d never thought of it before until I saw the above video posted on Boing Boing about a month ago, but since a lighter-than-air gas (like helium) makes your voice higher, a denser-than-air gas makes your voice lower. Neato!

Back when I lived in Fukuoka, Japan, a girlfriend showed me a flier for a waxing place that used the  above logo. The concept and execution are so wonderfully bizarre; the ugliness of the monkey, the little red bow, its proud display of its freshly waxed, hairless armpits…

I saved the flier for a while, but somehow it got lost in the shuffle. Years later when I started this blog, I wanted to share the logo with my readership, but I couldn’t remember the name of the waxing place, and a google search of “Japanese monkey hair removal logo” unsurprisingly failed to bring up anything meaningful.

Just yesterday I randomly ran into it again as a part of this collection of Japanese trademarked characters. That entry also links to an extensive database of Japanese trademarks; it’s incredibly user-unfriendly, but still pretty interesting. It can be found here.