[GAMES] Hero of the Kingdom II (2015)

Lol, I had no idea that just by opening the game I will spend the entire night playing it and finishing it.

HotK is a relatively short quest game with simple mechanics and story that is quite perfect for people who like to not stress out over a game. And you go from zero to hero as well. The way it looks like can be seen from the logo shot, it's very simple and does not require much from your computer, so much so that my poor and outdated laptop did not go berserk on me from overheating, huffing and puffing (I mean the hidden object games I play should be the easy ones, but they're not) and this was essential to me for finishing it in one sitting. So yay for games like that.

As for the quests and the adventure it is simple as well (it's shallow but what to do with it, it is how it is). You come along with your sister to a shore, but your sister is kidnapped by pirates. Thus you build up your reputation and money to find a way to save her which is to build the ship of your own and by the order of the king you also travel the sea in search of the pirates only to find out there is more to the story.

The world of the HotK is a fantasy world (which we always love), so among the historical type of setting you'll see some creatures.

The quests are simple find and help and sell and get reputation and money type.

I must say, the moment I found out how I can make money without looting and support the expenses without stressing it out I was the happiest (after all with all the looting things stop from appearing on the screen, so you can't just loot the woods and sell things indefinitely). Because that combo of buying wood, making it into a charcoal and then selling it to the blacksmith and earning on the difference was a game changer.

It's great that this is a series. I suppose each time you start as a new character and build your way up. Even in this game there is a reference to the first game.

All in all nice.

[ANIME] Given -ギヴン- Hiiragi mix (2024)

I believe this is the first movie of the two, the second being titled Umie? But it's the second movie in order of release.

Note: I've been out of touch with anime and manga for years now, even though I loved it so much since childhood, yes, I was watching anime since I was 4 and my first one was Windaria, you can imagine how that fucked me up. But what greatest impact it had on me is that was my first tragic story I guess. Even if I did not understand it at all, but some of the imagery was burned into my memory. And as a grown-up I came in touch with BL as genre. I was reading a lot before I settled down on few autors that I may check from time to time. One of those authors is Kizu Natsuki, author of Given manga. I'm honestly happy for her success, she has distinct style of art and storytelling. This is why despite my detachment from anime overall I still kept coming back to finish the manga and also watched its' anime adaptation.

This is why we're here.

I don't see myself picking up anime again, but I see myself still supporting authors and their works that were with me for years and years.

Well, Hiiragi mix is obviously concentrated on Hiiragi and Shizusumi, who were part of Yuki's band when he was alive. I think it follows the part of the manga that also had "mix" in the title. I honestly forgot, my memory isn't that extensive.

Now that they're facing the fact that their own guitarist quit the band the borrow Uenoyama as temporary member. And now Uenoyama came closer to what Yuki's music sounded like.

Part of the movie is the part with Uenoyama finding out that there is a possibility for them to debut as Given band, but Mafuyu avoids this topic.

Another extensive part of it is of course about Hiiragi and Shizu, having a glimpse at their childhood, how they came together and became friends. How each of them copes with the loss of Yuki and how they treated their music from then on. And of course how one loves another secretly, but definitely have misunderstandings about each other. Shizu thinks that Hiiragi once loved Yuki too, but because Yuki was with Mafuyu he did not want to be a third wheel, but Hiiragi actually just idolized Yuki as a person and never wanted to be with him in that sense, he loved Shizu a lot, but it never came across.

Actually some of it is humorous and cute how they animated the interactions.

But I'll be honest, sometimes I find the inner monologues that mostly deliver all the inner thoughts of characters be very Japanese, it gives off the feeling of "I'm 14 and this is deep". 

In general the production of this anime is great. I like that for years now the industry finally found the key to get BL to a bigger audience, they concentrate on the plot and skip anything explicit. And suddenly we have so many BL animes coming out.

The style is great, it follows the manga closely giving this story life in motion.

Still one thing that makes me lol a bit since the time when the anime series came out is the music. Music is the big part of this manga and the lives of these boys, but honestly it works so well in manga, but it does not have the same feeling in anime for me.

Simply because the manga and anime, which follows the plot, make you feel like Mafuyu has the most insane voice you can think about (judging by reactions of Uenoyama and others), but when it comes to singing it's just a generic voice actually. The same goes for this movie, they mulled so much about the demos that Yuki left unfinished and they have such intense reaction to it that I thought I'm going to hear something out of this world, but nope, it's the same generic sound that many bands have. The song may make it sound different, but the sound is so forgettable that it's painful. Maybe for boys it's meaningful, but otherwise they make me feel like I'm tone-deaf and don't understand music at all.

RATE: 8/10. In general it's a great story with laughter and sadness. And it's great they're doing projects like these.

[ANIME] Little Witch Academia - リトルウィッチアカデミア (2017)

Little Witch Academia is one of those animes I put on indefinite hold (literally been years) to return to them whenever the mood strikes, after all when I still have interest in them I choose to keep it for later, but it feels like I never get around them haha. There are animes I can put on hold, but eventually I lose interest in them and let go.

It doesn't mean that Little Witch Academia was some phenomenal watch, but just the theme of witches and a magic school was enticing and it looked fun. And I also watched the movie and that short episode that I believe appeared first.

But yesterday I simply made myself watch it instead of waiting  for that ethereal mood to arrive.

Actually, it's a quite naive watch. Idealistic and naive. It's very simple when it comes to the theme, but it does execute the idea. From zero to hero kind of story. It's also interesting to find the revelations of the last episodes, maybe my favorite part outside of some characters' antics. That Akko's magic was taken away without her knowledge, but the person who took it actually gave her the best motivation and life and her life goals.

It's also nice to see that the final part and union was done between two girls that were opposing each other for the entire series, Akko and Diana, but whose goals could not be closer. I could imagine their couple would have gathered a following.

In general it was fun to watch, colorful and dynamic. Very much what Trigger studio would do. I had my own fun with a lot of ridiculous parts, almost like slapstick comedy. Must admit Sucy was my favorite, with her sharp delivery of facts and unmatching personality. Other parts of delivering cliche monologues for this type of story simply me laugh (what can I do, it's so idealistic and naive). I had to remind myself - I watch young kids. But honestly Akko and her firends did so much damage to the school during their time ahaha. It was as if I watch the kids not having sense of self-preservance at all.

Some parts were truly ridiculous if you think about them for a sec. Not like this show tries to be serious anyway. 

I laughed a lot at the final scene where Croix was being escorted and the Headmaster says - You can return anytime. While Croix is solely responsible for the mess. And they act as if it doesn't matter. Tsk.

Ngl characters outside of the few main are quite shallow and one-sided.

The only thing to complain about is almost a direct depiction of the conflict between Ireland and GB, which is a real thing and shouldn't be a part of the whimsical witchy story in my opinion.

Oh yeah, forgot to mention that students of the all-boys school Appleton (?) appeared in clothes that appeared similar to you-know-who. Which was weird.

RATE: 7/10.

[Historical Romance] When the Marquess met his Match by Laura Lee Guhrke

What happens when a carefree, disreputable, stone-broke bachelor is forced to find a wife in a hurry? He hires a matchmaker, of course. What happens when the matchmaker doesn’t want to help him? Well, that’s when the fun begins…

Nicholas Stirling, Marquess of Trubridge, loves his life just as it is: dissolute, scandalous, and deuced good fun. His father, the Duke of Landsdowne is not amused, and when he cuts off Nicholas’ trust fund, the fun-loving marquess is forced to find an alternate source of income—in other words, he has to marry an heiress.

Every new-money American heiress knows Lady Belinda Featherstone is the key to social acceptance. Once a new-money nobody herself, Belinda discovered first-hand how heartbreaking the game of love and matrimony could be after a reprobate British earl married her for her money. Now a respectable widow, Belinda has become England’s most successful matchmaker, guiding young American heiresses through the hazards of the London season and helping them to find husbands worthy of them. To her mind, the Marquess of Trubridge is nothing but a fortune-hunting scoundrel and she has no intention of allowing him to charm his way into any American girl’s heart, including her own.

An American Heiress in London. Book 1

After reading I realized that I actually haven't read this series, simply mixed it with another one. But actually I'm happy, more of her books left to read. Even if I have enough books to read, but I try not to reach out for them often, simply because Guhrke is only one of few authors I even read in this genre of historical romance. So I read books sparingly not to run out of material.

Finding a new beloved author in this genre is a task I say. When I was younger I read a lot of HR, but only a name or two stuck with me till this day.

And I'm being sentimental for a reason, I truly adore how Guhrke writes and sets her characters. She is one of those authors that prove to me that HR can be a good book.

Lady Featherstone is a prominent matchmaker in the London society, she is now widowed and it's her craft to help American heiresses to find an appropriate match.

What other may not know is that her own marriage was a disaster that left her scarred for years and this became her motivation in leading young and impressionable girls. She was once swept away by passion and was seduced, but when the marriage was set in stone her husband showed his true side, that he was only after her money and was not going to spend his time on her and after paying off all his debts he started to live lavishly with Belinda's money, until he died of heart attack on one of his mistresses.

Her current task is to pair her close family Rosalie, but one person threatened the matching.

Nicholas appeared in front of her with a simple goal, he is after money after his trust fund was cut off. He wanted to ask for help, thinking that Belinda will comply wih his request, but instead found the biggest opposition from her side.

They did not start well, although like in many HR books they feel that thread of attraction and admit the handsomeness of another person, but it does not change what they think of one another.

Belinda simply spread the news of what he is going to do and why he came back from Paris and joined the season. But instead Nicholas used Rosalie as means of blackmail, he won't touch the girl (though he'd never would anyway) and Belinda helps him find a wife.

At first it's just a joke from her side, like she lets him meet one that is a chatterbox emptyhead, another is too serious about being intelligent.

In the meantime Belinda realizes the devilish charm of her client, while Nicholas was always honest how attractive her finds Belinda, this unwanted passion became quite an obstacle between the two and their goal.

What I truly adore is that setting, seemingly impossible situation where they have to stick together.

What I adore more that in the process they find more about each other and bare what's inside.

Belinda's prejudice is based solely from her failed marriage, this is why she is so opposed to Nicholas and his main goal, although she admits she is passionate about him, but she does not respect him as a man.

Nicholas shared his life being manipulated by his own father, like his first love was bought off, his famous scandal is nothing more but a fram-up from his father etc. he never even entered university he wanted and living in constant need to oppose and dig at him. Thus his reputation was notorious and not ideal among the bride market. But Belinda's words actually woke him up, even if they were truly hurtful. He indeed lived a life under influence of his father. When he realized he'd like to do something he knew a gentleman actually knows nothing outside of managing the estates, which was not helpful in any type of work.

It was fateful that at the end of the story he found his goal, since his estate that belonged to him always produced beer, but for his own family and not commercial purpose, he decided to change that. yet again his father came in to create troubles for him, but this time Belinda rushed in to save the day, like a knight in shining armor to save the beauty. After all she was also a wealthy lady all along. And she could invest into business and she will, because she loved the man, she saw his changes because of her.

In general it's such a nice story, with great character development and great romance.

RATE: 4/5

[Chinese BG novel] 笨蛋大小姐，但万人迷 by 竹外疏狂 / Silly, but charming lady

The next installment by the author of my personal favorite "Villain show" and "Three rebellious brothers" (of course the titles are shortned).

Original name of this novel was "One day I became a fake daughter" which can be seen from the cover, but later was quickly renamed to what it is today, I of course freewheeled in translating it, but it conveys the meaning. Once again I will be putting up my own summary too.

Summary: Shen Yi had a dream before she celebrated her 17th birthday, she saw the future in it in which she became a fake daughter and did not want to move out, did many things and soon met her bad ending. Shen Yi was puzzled because she was definitely not that type of person at all. But she was still stressed and afraid, what if she will become uncontrolled.

When the truth came out she moved out and refused to return to the Shen family.

But unlike the awaited scorn and disgust that she saw in her dreams the things were different in reality, her friends did not turn away from her, her fiance was there for her too. And even her brother and the true daughter moved in to live with her.

Although this novel is short by the number of chapters, but each chapter is like 10k characters in original, compared to usual 3k. And even if it feels like not much, there is still something to unpack between the lines.

I have no idea what this author does with her novels that gets to me, because from one side we have these tropey stuff and unimaginably cliche things like fake daughters and also if you read their works they read as if you watch a drama series, it's very engaging, but from another side they do not take the cliche path when it comes to the core situation and emotional exploration. How many stories are all the same where one of the fake/true daughters is good and other is evil. And how many of them actually explore any other type of situation with fake and true daughter actually being friends? Here is a completely different situation, it's more real? Because Shen Yi is full of guilt when she realizes that her dreams are actually true, she is a bit envious of the excellence of Jiang Yue (true daughter), but she also accept that Jiang Yue is truly great and kind. She also admits that even if she feels guilty, a very small part of her still wanted to stay or not allow things to be revealed, as she would continue to live with her family she cherished for so many years, but she also knew that her conscience will eat her alive if she attempted that. Which is totally human, unlike many of the melodrama stories that exist purely for entertainment with one person being so painfully one-sided in their pursuit of hate, vengeance or whatever.

Shen Yi despite often being described as silly and cute actually has a resilient personality, she might be silly a bit, but when you dig deeper you realize why she is like that, what made her like that, she might be showing her dissatisfaction, but she is not a petty personality, she knows what is right to do. For example, when she is asked to be replaced by Jiang Yue at the sports meeting so Jiang Yue will get points for her scholarship. She might have acted a bit, but she still gave up her place. To me it's true and more complicated personality shown than plain envy, that she is okay with allowing herself to be replaced, but she's not some saint that won't grumble about it a bit. Or how one of the characters, Xu Qingzhe saw her trying to clean the fish, because she's a lady from wealthy family she never touched these things, but despite her facial expressions and initial fear she still finished what she's supposed to do.

So even if some might find parts of her character unlikable, she's a nice main character overall. It's a nice journey to see what actually matters for her.

Also the novel has a type of open ending considering romantic relationships. Not because they're young, but because of what happens in the novel and how several lines of relationships were developed. They were not developed in a romantic way in any shape or form, but they have that potential.

/SPOILERS/

A bit of spoilers per usual.

I hope I won't rant for too long.

As explained Shen Yi has this type of personality, a bit of spoiled lady with a temper, but not much. She is actually pretty cheerful and cute.

When she realizes that her dreams are true, she can't help but feel guilty towards Jiang Yue, by this time they have a great relationship and they became friends. Shen Yi found out that she is Jiang Yue's savior and hero in a way.

But now things are different. Living with the knowledge of her replacing someone Shen Yi was completely devastated and when she came to the pivotal point that changed her life - car accident - she felt relieved that it happened, that now she can be more honest about things she knows but can't explain (prohibition).

Instead of staying with the Shen family, she moves out and lives with the Jiang family, she actually doesn't care much about wealth and stuff, for her family happiness is more importnat.

The one who acts the weirdest is father Shen. Has no official name actually, just Father Shen.

Later we find out that there is a reason for him acting like that, because he knew much earlier that his daughter was not his. But because she was raised at his home with his own beliefs of what a lady should look like he made the choice not to reveal the truth. Some of it can be traced to the middle when Shen Yi remembers that when she was younger she actually ate more and gained weight, so she was prone to gaining weight like her biological brother, but Father Shen made few harsh comments about her looks, which made her self-conscious and she lost weight eventually. Between the lines you can read that the influence of Father Shen is what built a character like Shen Yi, more like her unruly side, but the one who truly put a hand on her education was actually her friend Meng Zhihan, she was the one who took part explaining the right and wrong of life to Shen Yi. But to Father Shen it was no difference which daughter comes or goes, because he did not look at them as people, but more like tools, which is revealed much later. This became the reason for Jiang Yue and Shen Yu to leave the Shen family and move close to Shen Yi, so they could stay together, unlike Father Shen all children did not inherit his type of thinking. But also under pressure Father Shen shared the truth with the Wen family and consequently Wen Que, Shen Yi's fiance, knew the truth too, which consequently led to Shen Yi and Wen Que breaking up (although at first it felt like they'll stay together, since Wen Que did not care if she's Shen's daughter or not), because Shen Yi couldnt accept this act of lie. She disliked being lied to the most and also she hated that the choice of what to do with her life was made for her, by her father and Wen Que. Although this happened closer to the end of the novel of course, these revelations and break-ups. Before that I tought that Wen Que would be official ML, but he actually didn't feel like it at the same time, since other two male character had a development with Shen Yi that could lead to some sort of romance if author would give them a chance, basically what author did is to build a base for all three emotional lines and left it at that, without giving any of the male characters further development.

/-/

It was actually quite a heart-warming story with a bit of expanding family. It was nice to see how the younger generation acted about the situation and stuck together no matter what.

RATE: 5/5.

[MOVIE] Labyrinth (1986)

Sarah is on the journey to pass the Labyrinth and save her little brother from the Goblin King

So many years have passed and I'm still crushing on David Bowie in this movie. He was indeed my childhood crush okay.

I think I re-watched it more than a dozen times, each time at different period of time and each time I find different things and think of different things. Of course with all the modern tech knowledge it is impossible to look at it with childish eyes that had no idea about green screen or other means. Being older I can marvel at how the decorations and background work was done. I mean till this days I haven't seen anything that would sparkle as how this movie sparkled.

And the music. How great is the music in this one. 'As the world falls down' is still one of my favorite compositions ever.

It's such a wonderful story in its simplicity. The beginning is so on-point in showcasing Sarah's character and how she just wants to do her own thing instead of obligations of an older sister. Honestly the kid cried so heartbreakingly. And Sarah couldn't take it anymore and wished for her brother to disappear, only to find out that he was indeed stolen.

It's such a good lesson of the consequences of "those were just angry words".

Now she is on the quest to save her brother and must go through the Labyrinth, meating friends and foes. Basically, having the adventure she always dreamt about. Labyrinth isn't only an adventure, but a path to her growing up.

And of course this movie wouldn't be it without David Bowie. It's not even a point of discussion❤

RATE: 10/10.

* * *

There's such a sad love

Deep in your eyes a kind of pale jewel

Open and closed

Within your eyes

I'll place the sky

Within your eyes

There's such a fooled heart

Beatin' so fast

In search of new dreams

A love that will last

Within your heart

I'll place the moon

Within your heart

As the pain sweeps through

Makes no sense for you

Every thrill is gone

Wasn't too much fun at all

But I'll be there for you-ou-ou

As the world falls down

Falling

As the world falls down

Falling

Falling in love~...

[Animation] Over the Garden Wall (2014)

Two half-brothers, Wirt and Greg, travel through the mysterious forest called the Unknown trying to find their way home and encounter some fantastical and unexpected things on their journey.

Interestingly I did not vibe with it when I first tried to watch it.

This just proves that there shouold be right time for what I read and watch.

With the right mood I could follow along with Wirt's overthinking and spontaneous Greg.

This journey not only allowed the two of them to see some wonderful and unexpected things, but also for Wirt to face his attitude towards Gregory. It is actually quite direct with how it portrays the relationship, the inability to communicate or expect a kid to do things you want them to with precision. And maybe some of the problems that arise are not the fault of a young kid who is always acting impulsively on-the-spot, but actually come from yourself and some of your imperfections.

Also the overall visuals are great. Especially for those who love Autumn.

So on my second try I realized that it's a great watch.

RATE: 10/10.

10th Anniversary Stop Motion Short