A'sA: ODB: Update after SUCH a long delay.

Go read it!

Another update...

Well, diddle-do everyone, look who decided to log on today and write up some shite.

As for my life thus far... not so well. Though every once in a while something worthwhile will pop up, mostly it's nothing but well;.. nothing. I am working on some artwork (Toshi from my own series, Aozora's Adventure to be exact) and have recently commissioned or are in the process of commissioning several great talents on deviantART. I've also been spending some time on Farmville, unfortunately because I have nothing to do. And since my neighbor list is lacking, I haven't been able to do much in terms of receiving rare items and so forth. If you guys do have a Farmville profile and want to be neighbors with me, just go to the link to my Facebook page below, shoot me a friend request (be sure to specify that you came from here, otherwise I may reject it), wait for me to accept it, then fire a neighbor request right back, and bang, you're there.

Now let's focus on other things. For starters, if you've been to deviantART since last week and checked my journal, you probably saw that my somewhat sheer friendship with ViperAcidZX was shattered due to me joking around with him on his birthday. And as such, he has blocked me from all interaction with him on pretty much every site that both of us have an account on. The day later I tried resolving the issue by writing up a long-ass journal in hopes that Viper may stumble upon it. It's a little harsh here and there, but as with how he has treated me throughout my career as an amateur artist, I'd consider it "karma" to him. Since the topic has spread on for about a week, I've taken better matters that me, my friends, and my fans don't get concerned about the situation. Hopefully one way or another, Viper will realize that I'm not the only d*che around here, but for now, we'll see where things go in the end.

Second, I'd like to talk about me, myself and I. Once again, I apologize for my excessive lack of activity on deviantART or any other site I'm a member of. It's just as you may know, I like to do other things besides drawing, whenever it's going out with my family, pending time playing video games, and even browsing the world-wide-web. My life isn't just deviantART. I'd love to have something new every three days or so, but with how things are going, it seems as if it will be a while before I can accelerate on my work basis. Until then, keep patient everyone. I'm sure it will all work out in the end.

So that's it for now. As a bonus, I'd like to present you with the current collection of Mario Hacks Series Recordings, now loaded with music from nineteen different Super Mario Bros. hacks.

Download

Everything you could possibly want in an Angry Birds press kit plus more.

Yep, I recently got the PC version of Angry Birds, and just to show you how much I love you, I decided to post a full, complete rip of everything you'll see in the current version of the PC/Mac OS X versions, just so you don't have to go searching through the resources folder or waste your trusted buck-a-ros.

But let me just cut the BS and give 'ya the link. Warning. Contains Smiling Swine.

Click me, brawk!

The terrible but shocking truth of Rosenkreuzstilette

I have been waiting for this moment for a long time. Time to talk about the doujin game series Rosenkreuzstilette and share my personal opinions (yes, mine.) about the characters, games, series, and more importantly, it's fanbase, and two of it's key members (Bare in mind that I'm not doing any personal attacks. I'm just stating what these people have done wrong in contributing to the series, and the payoffs).

First off, if you're not familiar with Rosenkreuzstilette, you're not alone. Many people in all these online communities are also unaware of the series, and that's what makes it so obscure to many of us. Just to recap, Rosenkreuzstilette (or RKS is the title is just so confusing to spell) is a doujin soft series created by Japanese circle [erka:es], whose main (and only) employes are Isemiya, the game's main programer, and WOMI, the series' main artist, character designer, and graphic artist. Outside of RKS, WOMI specializes in drawing adult-rated fan-artwork of role-playing games, many of whom feature Clair Lasbard from Square Enix's Star Ocean series, whom I personally describe as WOMI's prime idol. Together with Isemiya, WOMI travels to Summer/Winter Comiket every August/December to sell copies of RKS and his own fan-doujins, all for a profit. At the time, this was the only way to get Rosenkreuzstilette, but in Summer 2009, the circle released a digital version of RKS for download on an adult site called DLsite, one of few places where you can post manga/video games you created and host them for a profit even if you didn't design anything in it from scratch w/o getting yo' ass sued to high heck.

So now that I told you a bit about the series and the two responsible for starting it, let's begin with what the first game is, and what it is about. Released on New Year's Eve in 2007, the original Rosenkreuzstilette, which was initially created as an adult game, ended up transforming into a full-out Mega Man clone that took Spirita Rosenberg, a blond-haired hazel/green-eyed woman (whom I think is around 20yrs. old.) in a world where superpowered- human beings were hated upon, on a quest to stop her teammates, whom are part of The Blades of the Rose Cross, which is a organization consisting of all the major protagonists, all 97% female, who go unexpectedly against her in an effort to start a holy war. In traditional Mega Man style, you go through a prologue stage, then against Spiritia's fellow Magi, then to two castles where you fight off the last bosses, and face the game's main antagonist, Iris Sepperin. For a clone, it works, but of course, there are some things that set it back. The first game in the series succeeded in telling a well-detailed storyline, presenting us with a bunch of beautiful and colorful characters, introducing a lust-filled environment filled with ruins, castles, and towers (Castlevania, anyone?), but fails at presenting an original (even semi-original) experience, featuring character/level/gameplay traits that are taken directly from Mega Man or one of it's many spinoff series, among other titles (Don't believe me? Check out the Game over screens). Now I know these constant "references shoved into your face" are supposed to be somewhat "nostalgic", but these don't help much.

Now I have to mention the music in the game. Yes it is quite a good OST for a doujin game, and I wouldn't mind having some of the tracks on my iPod, but their way of utilizing the BGM and the time they're used kills the whole thing. Take the stage BGM for Zorne's stage, which is very upbeat and joyfull, and place it into a lava-filed cavern filled with boiling hot magma, and then the boss theme, Upbeat during an epic fight? Oh don't get me started. Get the point? Just doesn't work. But that's not to say it didn't work with the other BGMs in this game, like Luste and Grolla's, which their music perfectly fits their stages.

So now that I gave you a little info on what I think about RKS, it's time to summarize what my final opinions are. If you're a die-hard Mega Man fan and enjoy lovely anime girls, you'll probably enjoy this title. If not, then you'll probably be bored with it and find it repetitive once you reach the first castle. Overall, not bad, but nothing special. I give it a 7.4/10, or 74%, which is a passing grade. I know other people have given much higher scores to this game, but remember, everyone has their own opinions about games. Hopefully the upcoming sequel, Rosenkreuzstilette ~Freudenstachel~ will fare better than it's prequel in terms of originality and value, but we'll see in August.


Perhaps now you'd like to hear what I think about the fanbase to this wonderful series? Well, first to mention, is the bonus content the staff were happy to present. We got a bonus hidden game, some promotional artwork. and... that's it. No fansite kit w/ downloadable renders and logos, no wallpaper/icon downloads, no concept sketches, no nothing. I know not every series needs to have bonus content, but it would be at least nice to see some more content from WOMI than him just pushing out concept art. We did get a preview of Trauare's RKSF sprite and a sketch of Iris, but other than that, zilch. Not even we are able to contact them easily. They have a mailing system right on their site, but they only rarely reply to fan mail and messages, never will they do all of them, no matter what the prime subject is.
In terms of what the fans have produced, not so well either. Now to be fair, RKS isn't and will never be as popular as the widely-recognized Touhou Project, because RKS is younger, has only one game, has roughly around 15 characters that actually have key roles in the series, but for some reason, I prefer Rosenkreuzstilette. I dunno maybe it's the way the characters are drawn.

From what I can assume, many of you probably first herd of RKS via the popular Mega Man fansite Rockman Perfect Memories. It has an entire section devoted to the game (plus a full MP3 rip, as well as and severely-outdated page on the sequel. I'm sure before I came into town, this was the prime page to get your daily dose of RKS info, but then in December 2008, a new site arose that was entirely based on Rosenkreuzstilette surfaced. It was a blog created using Google's popular Blogspot service by good 'ol Xelamint, entitled Schwer and Schwer Alike. It seemed like a good idea, but however putting a guy like him in patrol of a site like that isn't, however. Mint is somewhat egotistic, can't take criticism properly (the previous two words came from Puistink), and only thinks the Japanese RKS fans are the only ones that actually put love into the series while the American side does barely anything to support it in anyway possible. I also suppose he, along with AmethystViper are the only ones that think they "get" RKS and know everything about it, and thus gives them the right to brag about the lack of good-quality stuff on the English side of the fanbase. Plus, Viper's fanart contest pretty much wasn't that successful and well-processed, with the concept of having each judge (there were three) select the overall best piece for the contest in terms (which the winner was hissatsukunn, the guy also responsible for designing cute & lovable Dolis Warmind) the must humorous piece (which was given to YukoHanna) and one other mitscalascionus piece.

So what do we do to get RKS more popular?

Well, first off, forming a good fanbase is a gradual process, not flipping on a light switch. Isemiya and WOMI need to keep us entertained with different products, characters and games, as well as expand on the RKS universe before they can draw in a good number of fans outside the series' country of origin, including all those excellent and well-known artists and MAD authors. Look at how long it took Touhou Project to get this popular. You expect RKS to become an instant hit *fingersnap* just like that? No. Just be patient, wait it out, and see where the series goes, hoping Isemiya and WOMI can make us remain w/ the series long enough to develop a good English-language fanbase. If not, well, you'll see. In the meantime, we can help by (attempting to) spread the word.

I spoke enough. /(v__-¡)\

Mario & Luigi DOS hack Gameplay

Well hello once again everyone. This is my first post of the new month (and no, it has nothing to do with Groundhog Day, which was just yesterday).

But anyways, Check out what I scouted out on Youtube today.

This is a gameplay video of my rather short Super Mario World hack Mario & Luigi, which was my effort around a year ago to re-create the Super Mario DOS clone under the same title. Sometime after it was released, Youtuber DarkMurdoc666 did a complete playthrough of the hack, and went through all 6 of the main levels. He did miss the secret areas in several of the stages, but that's pretty much the whole purpose about secrets.

Speaking of SMW hacking, sometime in the future, I plan to gather a team and develop a much longer hack of my own w/ more levels than this one. Proving that my SMW Central account is still active and not defunct for my long inactivity.

Angry Birds Sound effects anyone?

UPDATE/REVISION (4/10/2018):
Well, it's been a long time coming, but ever since this post was made lots of things have changed regarding Angry Birds and getting it's sound effects. And with that, not much reason to keep this post around for much longer. (and just so I can burry and hopefully keep buried a really cringey idea.)

The continuing hunt for more Japanese SMB hacks/roms...

Yea I know, another post in such a short amount of time. Man, I really need to get my a## onto deviantART and write a new journal there. But since I'm here, and because Blogger lets you put pictures and full videos into your posts, I thought this would be a better place to discuss things.

Now if you read one of my final posts of 2010, you may remember I had my mind set on a Japanese hack of the ever-so-popular Super Mario Bros; entitled Mario Evolution True 2. Now believe it or not, there is actually many more hacks that originated from that region, with a handful of them featuring altered soundtracks. Unfortunately though, with the exception of the ones posted on this thread over at board2, it seems .ips download links for the other hacks remain hidden. I believe they are present on Japanese socializing site 2ch, but the site's suggested language make it very difficult to find the hacks, and even if I was to succeed in snagging them, the .ips would probably not work because the Japanese perhaps uses a different program that's not LunarIPS or MultiPatch to patch their hacks, and thus the .ips files are not compatible with the well-known American programs.

As I had stated with Mario Evolution True 2, the main reason why I am collecting these hacks is because, besides just enjoying the levels, I like ripping the music in .mp3 format so that it can be put onto a popular .mp3 player. This I have already done with several different Famicom titles not related to Mario, but since I want to keep my collection of .mp3s growing, these are my next big plan for updating the library.

The music rips are part of a series I like to call "Mario Hack Series Recordings", which as it's name implies, is a series consisting of custom BGM used in various SMB hacks, regardless of the original author(s) of the hack. Below is a link to download the current set of 11 songs in the series, featuring custom BGM from seven different (and well-created) hacks.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=94BJCSTX

Now what's in for the future of this series? Well as of now, these are the hacks I would like to rip/record the soundtracks of following the ones mentioned above (again, besides just playing them for fun).

*NEW*SUPER MARIO ABC!!!- A difficult puzzle hack where you basically play a level as Luigi and try to get into a pipe positioned inside the B. Interestingly, the letter Z is absent.

DESIRED RIPS- Overworld

*NEW*Transformers Mario- Based on the (well-hated) Famicom title "Transformers: Convoy no Nazo", this hack pits you in control of Mario trying to rescue Luigi. There is only one level, which is a re-creation of 1-1 from SMB, except the underground bonus area which is replaced by several rooms where the goal is to kill all enemies, then enter a pipe to go to the next one. Items and enemy behavior are adjusted, and music and sounds are configured to sound like Transformers: CNN. The game can end in three different ways, but only one of them is considered a "good" ending.

DESIRED RIPS- Title Screen, Overworld, Underground

STAR REMIX- A well detailed hack where you play as a star going to rescue a Fire Flower while avoiding different colored halos. Contains 4 levels.

DESIRED RIPS- Overworld/Underground, Underwater, Ending

ELEGANCE- A decent hack that starts of as a remake of the original SMB with minor edits to graphics and excellent BGM remakes, then evolves into a difficult hack that spans 8 levels, including a spooky ninth level achieved by entering a warp zone in the first stage.

DESIRED RIPS- Overword, Underground, Toad's Path, Toad's Greeting, The Spooky 9th World, Princess Rescue

NULLPO/NULL POINTER EXCEPTION-A single level hack with custom BGM that pits Mario against Shift_JIS characters that Mario kills instantly on contact. Features the same fake pass-through blocks as Sakura.

DESIRED RIPS- Overworld, Ending

AUTOMATIC- Probably the easiest Mario hack ever, where you are constantly locked in walking straight to the right. Four levels, and a somewhat random ending.

DESIRED RIPS- Overworld

NINJA MARIO SKY- An extremely difficult hack where Mario is re-colored black and blue, and is able to move faster horizontally. He can turn in mid-air at a sharper rate, and must abuse glitches to win. Features some custom graphics, and most importantly, an epic remix of the original castle theme from SMB.

DESIRED RIPS- Dungeon

SUSIE POPAI BOSS- An incredibly bizarre six-level hack where Mario is put up against enemies with his own image. Many should recognize the Underground theme as being Geno's Forest from Super Mario RPG, but I'm mainly focused on all the other songs in the hack. I should also mention it has two different endings, with the "bad" ending being very similar to the instant-death paths from the Kamikaze Mario series.

DESIRED RIPS- Into Level, Overworld, Dungeon, Underwater, Ending

ULTIMATE BRUTAL ALL-VERTICAL- a single-level hack which features a 8-bit rendition of popular Touhou project song U.N. Owen Was Her. You constantly ascend in one long vertical level with killer jump abilities and Koopa-like enemies that instantly wake up when you stomp them.

DESIRED RIPS- Overworld

Now yes, I know many of these hacks would be considered "hardcore," and I would have excessive difficulty reaching the chance to record some of them, but I can just input the Game Genie code "AETLTK" into the emulator and I can jump as high as I want.

SONG GET! (+Cool Angry Birds Skit)

Here with a quick update. I recently found out the song I was trying to describe in the previous post is actually "Ravers Fantasy" by Manian. Apparently so my expected lyrics matched only the beat of the song, but after three good years, it's good to finally be able to listen to this again, and this time actually have it on my iPod.

Believe it or not, there actually exists multiple versions of this song. The one I'm more well-known with (and probably the best one by far) is the "Tune Up" version shown below:

And because I'm a bit of an Angry Birds nut, I would also like to show off this clip from Comedy Central's tosh.O comedy television series.

Tosh.0	Tuesdays 10pm / 9c
Angry Birds
www.comedycentral.com
Tosh.0 Videos Daniel Tosh Web Redemption

If the above embed window doesn't appear/work, you can just go to the official page to see it.

Hunting for this one specific song...

Hello once again SJTB readers. Justin here requesting more help from my fabled viewers. But first, some minor updates.

Apparently I've started playing Capcom's mobile hit The Smurfs' Village on iOS, and already it's addicting like heroin. I've played it on my sister's iPod Touch and iPad, both spending a lot of time on each unit, and so I finally I decided to get it for my own iPod Touch (which, let's be honest, doesn't have a lot of memory remaining). In fact, I ended up purchasing about 50 bucks worth of Smurfberries to level up my town faster and unlock exclusive content. So Capcom pretty much got all of my remaining iTunes balance, leaving me with only 12 cents. :B

But now we move onto the main topic at hand. Yea I know a lot of my blogposts have been questions to readers, but what the hey, let's get a move on here.

Now about four years ago, back in 2007, I saw a Youtube Poop entitled "That's the last time I'm going fishing" (at least, I think that's what it's called, because the vid is no longer available). During the end of the video, part of this one techo-styled song starts playing. By looking into the comments, I was able to listen to the full song, but unfortunately, forgot both the name, and many of the lyrics to the song. From what my brain remembers, here's what it sounds like:

This is my fantasy, nonono,

This is my fantasy, nonono,

This is my fantasy, nonoNO,

Do wa be chen no wa,

This is my fantasy, nonono,

This is my fantasy, nonono,

This is my fantasy, nonoNO,

FIVE FOUR THREE TWO ONE

Do wa be chen no wa.

If anyone knows what song I'm trying to figure out (or it's author), please post it in the comments; or if you haven't figured out how to comment on Blogger w/o an account, please, contact me.

COS3 ("incomplete") Fansite Kit now live

Yep, another Shikigami no Shiro-related post. Not long ago, I asked the staff of Aksys Games (American distributor of Castle of Shikigami III) if they could assemble a fansite/press kit containing all character artwork and bust-art/mugshots used in the game, and they were more than happy enough to create one on the spot.

The contents of this kit contain all official character artwork used in various media to promote Shikigami no Shiro III, and one mugshot for each character.

You can go download the fan-kit here. You know you want to.

A little head's up about upcoming artwork...

NOTE: This post may get a little suggestive. Sorry. ^^;

Yea, I'm updating the blog once again because I'd like to explain something. First off, I'm only directing this to those that have deviantART accounts, because, well, it's somewhat 15+ rated, so that means this picture will probably be tagged with MC (though I feel it's not necessary, but who cares :?).

But anyways, the reason why I'm explaining this is so that people aren't going to nag about it once I submit the artwork, because it relates somewhat to rejected content from my old, pathetic series, which I had forgotten about well over a year ago. By rejected, I mean that not long after I introduced the series around the web, these characters were soon discontinued because I just felt like not having those type of characters in the series. As I have stated over a million times in the past, Super Justin is guaranteed not to make a return, because I feel as if I wrecked lives enough with myself as an anime boy stomping around town. And besides, these characters won't probably remind you of Super Justin, although I did pair up one of the characters with Justin (which I removed from dA, and besides, hardly anyone probably saw it).

The characters mentioned above are actually nagis, female human-snake hybrids, which I designed not long after I decided to put characters from Rosenkreuzstilette into my old pathetic and sad excuse of a "franchise" (and trust me when I say this, I regret ever doing so). The main of the three, whom I called Ziki, is a busty blue/pink/violet nagi with a pink tail. She has an abundance of blue and pink body paint, a trait also shared by Kurayami, an antagonist from my current series, Aozora's Adventure. Ziki was originally intended to be one of the central love interests with my cartoon-self, but she was soon rejected in favor of me instead being interested in Trauare Wrede (yea I know, another sad and pathetic idea). I only posted two artworks of Ziki on dA, both which were done long before I joined dA, and now both images are now in storage. One of them pictured her alongside myself, and the other was just solo artwork. Once again, I'm pretty positive no one whom had a permanent grudge against my series knew about her or saw the artwork(s), but incase you did, forget that she had anything to do with or even knows about Super Justin.

The other two nagis, Lsa and Musi, were originally intended to be the offspring of Ziki, with Lsa inheriting the playfull and cheerfull personality of Ziki, and Musi being a dark, gothic figure. They both wear an abundance of body paint, again like their mother. In this re-drawing of them, I plan to discard them being daughters of Ziki, and just make them sisters or relatives. Nothing else.

So that's it. If you don't like this concept, then just keep your mouth shut and don't give a darn about the art once it's released, Otherwise, well;.. take a wild guess.

Super Mario Evolution 2 (Japanese SMB1 Hack) Info and troubleshooting

Hey my friends. Today is the last day of vacation before school starts again. The snow is melting, I'm still working on Sol-Badguy (sorry it's taking so long, guys!), and now with the new year rolling in, I'm hoping things don't possibly go any worse for me. I got a new Windows computer, but I have yet to set it up entirely (works fine, just need to get internet and a few other programs on there. I also plan to buy (online) some more PVC figures using the money I got for Christmas and expand my collection of PVC figures.

But the reason I'm here, is this:

This is Super Mario: Evolution 2 (yes, a Super Mario game. No anti-Mario/Nintendo comments please), a Japanese hack of the original classic Super Mario Bros. that has a Yoshi's Island kick to it. It puts you in the role of Mario's dino companion Yoshi as he ventures through nine levels to re-unite with Baby Mario. Unfortunately, despite being able to download it, I cannot get the hack to run. I tried patching the original SMB multiple times, but with absolutely no luck, as it only leads to a black screen. There is a readme file attached with the .lzh download, but I cannot read it.

So what I am asking, is if anyone out there could give me advice on how to actually apply the IPS patch so that it actually allows the hack to run. Below are the contents of the lzh. download, as listed on my Mac. I know how the .ips patch works, but I'm curious about the other two attached files. Is there anything I'm supposed to do with them?

If you're asking why I want to download this hack, just watch this for yourselves and listen to the BGM.

BTW, if you want to download the file, go here.

It's finally here...

Japanese commercials are god-Insane.

Well, before the new year rolls in, I 'd just thought I'd showcase some Japanese commercials I discovered on the Web just recently.

The first few are based on a line of Japanese noodles. Why I show them is because of their use of anime-styled characters, and the continuous running gag of them morphing into more realistic anime humans at one point in each CM.

It's not the whole collection, but just my favorites of them.

But it gets crazier. Who knew Ronald McDonald (yes, the clown from McDonalds. Can't believe I'm making that kind of reference) had a son and daughter? (even is the son is capable of pulling burgers out of his behind)

Requesting more help: Where is the Dots Design Builder?

UPDATE: For those of you who want a similar experience to the program I mention in this blog post, try this online virtual adaption of Dot-S.

You can also find out a little more about Dot-S by searching its Japanese name: "ドッツ"

___________________________________________________________

Hello everyone. First off before I start with the real news, happy Christmas Eve, because I want to be a nice guy every once in a while (although not a lot of people return the favor).

So anyways, recently I got back into playing with my collection of Dot-S, a Japanese toy product that had me hooked since like mid 2007, and to this day, it's still one of the best toys I've ever played with, alongside Cube World. Though the only downside is actually trying to scout out the different sets online. Because the word "Dots" is so commonly used, it took me a while before I actually found some sets for order online. I believe in Japan they are still being sold, so I'm probably going to waste some money further expanding my collection of Dot-S once I take a trip to Japan after I graduate from that rotten bag of tards known as school. Below is my current collection of Dot-S, excluding the boards and about half of the pins.

So incase your mind is having trouble focusing and keeping on track, let me explain what Dot-S are exactly. They're actually a line of toys manufactured by Tomytec/Tomy in 2005. You put each Dot (Peg) into a 16 by 16 board, in an attempt to create a picture using the pegs. To get even more creative, you can even mount multiple boards together for larger pictures. It's kinda like Lite-Brite, but much cooler.

So anyways, the reason why I'm here right now is to ask a huge favor.

Not too long ago, I discovered a Dot-S simulator simply known as the "Dots Design Builder", which offers a experience that almost is like playing with real Dot-S, but in virtuality. It offers every single pin and board color ever released, including the ones not available in the more commonly-known sets shown on the Dot-S homepage. I have it downloaded into my old piece of crud Windows (2000) computer, but I cannot pull off the program and put it on the new Windows computer I'm receiving for Christmas, nor can I download it because the site that hosted it for download no longer exists, and when I do archive it, the download link is completely broken. I have only found one other site with details on the program, but unfortunately there is no download link. So I am asking if anyone out there who possibly has the program to perhaps upload a download link somewhere so that it can be easily accessed by everyone.

On the plus side, however, I am currently working on fanart of Sol-Badguy, the main protagonist of the Guilty Gear series. Unfortunately, I will not finish it in time for Christmas, but hopefully I'll make some decent progress over winter recess.