It's Not All About The Boobies

Here's a brief, thowaway article on alternative manga i did for The London student. It doesn't really say anything new or interesting and it's not even especially comprehensive, but i thought i'd post it here for posterity's sake.

Your local bookshop hides a dark secret. It’s in a corner, hidden away…probably towards the back. It emanates exoticism, the unknown. The lights flicker eerily, and the ceiling is cobwebbed in a stereotypically hammer-horror fashion. The carpet is caked with grime and on the grime-caked carpet sits a grime-caked man with a grime-caked beard, in a Batman t-shirt.

I’m talking about manga, obviously! If you like buxom, anatomically-unlikely women and swords as giant phallic metaphors manga is for you!

Of course, this is all a horrible, horrible stereotype. We think of comic books as ‘sub-culture’ in the UK (with emphasis on the sub-...); Not so in Japan, where manga is enjoyed by a hugely diverse cross-section of the population. What I’m trying to say is that, in Japan, normal people read comic books. It truly is a paradise on Earth.

It’s a shame that in the UK we perceive comic books as being somehow infantile. This moronic and infantile attitude baffles me.

The manga I'd like to talk about are all seinen, that is, they’re classified as being appropriate for males aged 18-30. There’s a tradition of strict classification by gender/age in Japan, and it rarely reflects the readership, so don't let it put you off.

Mushishi is the antithesis of everything that you know and demonise manga for.
It's all about nature and people, and the interactions thereof.

Ginko, the titular Mushishi, is a witch doctor of sorts, possessed of a wry smile and the perpetual stub of a cigarette. Much of the narrative follows Ginko as he wanders the countryside, curing ailments and dealing with mushi. The mushi in question are ghostly, ethereal automata; Beings on the the thin line between life and non-life; They cause trouble but do so out of their own natures, not out of malice. More often than not, it is the greed or pride of a man which is to be blamed.

Mushishi is sedate and tranquil but it never drags, each stand-alone tale is an ode to the beauty and cruelty of nature.

Gantz is the 'Lost' of manga. Many think that its esoteric and often indecipherable plot is overrated, but it has managed to attract a cult following. The art, heavily indebted to virtual storyboard technology, is something to behold, the level of detail is unrivalled.
Gantz stands out, not because it's all about the action (they're plenty like that), but because it realises said action so well. Reading Gantz is exhilarating like few other comic books can ever hope to be.

Death Note should come with a health warning. If you start reading it be prepared to lose sleep until you finish it.
Shinigami, akin to grim reapers, play a rather prevalent role in Japanese pop-culture. Death Note injects the Shinigami myth into a dark, psychological thriller with truly unexpected results. The premise alone is enough to sell it: Student is bright yet bored. Student finds mysterious notebook. Student realises that upon writing a person's name in the notebook, the person will die. Needless to say, chaos ensues, and i'd be spoiling the fun if I were to elaborate.

Mushishi, Gantz and Death Note are but three notable titles of a veritable glut of thought-provoking and intelligent manga. Akira and Ghost In the Shell helped bring the medium into Western conciousness and are well worth a read. The work of Osamu Tezuka, considered the 'godfather' of manga is especially notable, recommended are Phoenix and Buddha. A classic historical epic comes in the form of Lone Wolf and Cub, spanning nearly 30 volumes. Honourable mention also goes to the grimy, multi-layered Tekkon Kinkreet: Black and White and the girly, but strangely compelling Oh My Goddess!

Listing things.

Lists tend to make for pretty lazy journalism. This list is a rare exception.

Tom Chick lists 10 genuinely innovative sci-fi settings in videogames, i.e. The ones that weren't just a polygonal Bladerunner (incidentally the official Bladerunner game was fantastic).

Igotlockedoutandcouldn'tgetinbutthenigotin. There, now you don't have to read the post.

It's a Sunday, i'm feeling wonderfully invigorated after being pelted by the shower, my hair is fresh and tousled, falling in moist ringlets over my eyes, head tilted coquettishly, towel slung casually over one shoulder...I'm sure you get the picture. It's a nice picture. Anyway...to my utmost horror my lock is completely and utterly jammed. Moments later horror strikes again, as i realise what a terribly mundane anecdote the whole affair is going to make. Anyway, five soggy hours later the Fearnley-Whittingstall-esque locksmith drags himself away from his glazed ham-shank for long enough to install a new one (a lock, not ham-shank), everything is wonderful, primroses burst from my ears, rainbows spill forth from the rather attractive warden's eyes, i realise that 5 hours sitting on a cold towel has done absolutely nothing for my mental health.

Anyway, i arrive home this evening, new key in hand glistening like excalibur, my wrist already swivelling in anticipation....It doesn't fucking work. To cut a long story short, The Halls in their infinite wisdom ordered a second new lock to replace the replaced one, slipping a letter underneath my door asking me to come and collect the new key. Can you spot the fatal flaw in their logic? They slipped a letter under my door. The bastards.

Ahem, i'm glad we got that over and done with, aren't you? Like an awkward first date, blogger and blog-reader mentally spar, both fickle in their commitment, attempting to interest but not to push to far. I hope i pitch at the right level, stories about getting locked out are always fascinating.

Founds some great stores in Camden the other week, the first being a record store; I can't remember what it was called but it has an old American DJ in the basement gently singing along to his choices. I bought The Auteur's second record in there. Right next door is a comic book shop owned by what must be a rather anal fellow, for he bags not just his singles but the trade paperbacks as well! What madness! What inconcievable insanity! But maybe he's onto something.

I apologise for not having much interesting to say right now, after the massive work-related climax of last week i'm in a distinctly post-coital lull, which i think may last well into next week.

Some girls only have room for themselves.

The Witch Riding Your Back

I've been reading up (on wikipedia of course) on sleep paralysis, something i've experienced for the last few years on a pretty regular basis. Basically, what happens during normal REM sleep is that the brain becomes hyperactive and the body is in a state of paralysis, 'sleep paralysis' occurs when the brain regains conciousness during REM sleep. The body remains in a state of paralysis and the experience usually coincides with extremely vivid hallucinations.

Pretty. Fucking. Terrifying.

"This leaves the person fully conscious, but unable to move. In addition, the state may be accompanied by terrifying hallucinations (hypnopompic or hypnagogic) and an acute sense of danger. Sleep paralysis is particularly frightening to the individual due to the vividness of such hallucinations."

I'm not sure i want to sleep now.

"The person may think that someone is standing beside them or they may hear strange sounds"

Eek.

Ulysses...

...is the name of the new Franz Ferdinand single. It's been doing the rounds for a while now, you can listen to it here.

I've been anticipating the new Franz material for a while now, and while this isn't terrible it certianly isn't great either. It strikes me as a very awkward amalgamation of musical styles. It's certainly a far cry from Franz at their best.

See what you think, anyway.

Got 3000 words to do for Friday, as well as revision.

Blah.

The Proverbial Note-On-The-Fridge

Just a quick post to let you know that there's going to be a distinct lack of prolixity until, at earliest, Friday afternoon. This is due to various factors, not least of which my stupidity at leaving a 3000 word essay until the last possible moment, and an exam on Friday morning.

But...yeah, thought i'd check in. And by way of keeping you occupied until then:

The Animal Collective's new album is the shiz, listen to the spacey new single 'My Girls' at their myspace. It's The Animal Collective at their most concise and accessible, and this turns out to be no bad thing.

RockPaperShotgun have an excellent interview up with Edmund McMillen. Distinctive artist behind some absolutely fantastic flash-gamery. Check out his Newgrounds profile for more info. Aether and Coil are particularly special. Seriously, check them out. They're short-form games, so they'll take up half an hour of your time at most, and i found them to be both thought-provoking and aesthetically brilliant.

Oh yeah, this week i found out that the cognitive scientist and philosopher Jerry Fodor is a total badass. Even more so than Chomsky maybe. There's a great article in Meaning And Cognitive Structure (Pylyshyn, Z. and Demopoulos, W.) in which he just has it out with two of his critics, in the format of a massive bitching session. Needless to say, he put them in their place. Pow!

A choice quote:

"Fodor (In response to Newell): Because you know that the subject solves that problem, and it's your problem to model how he does it. It's his problem and he knows how to solve it but you don't."

...anyways, i have some choice content updates planned for when i'm a free man again, most notable of which is something called DIARY OF A DWARVEN FORTRESS which is going to be weekly and i'm not going to tell you anything about it!

Must not link to some music, oh crud.

Didn't know that Sundays could be useful after all...

It's a Sunday morning and i have 3000 words of essay to pummel out of my caffeine-turgid brain. "What better time to champion some of my favourite independent games?", i think to myself, "No better time!".

I'll start with some oldies (but goodies)...oh, and they're all free by the way...

Ben There Dan That is that rarest of things: A well written and genuinely humorous indie game. Scratch that, the fact that it's well written and humorous makes it unusual amongst most games, be they indie or not. It's a point-and-clicker in the vein of such classics as Sam and Max Hit the Road and Monkey Island, and if you can get past the somewhat messy graphical style (I like it, personally) then there's a good few hours of fun to be had with this one. The dialogue is gold.



Chalk is one of the few SCHMUPs (see R-Type or Galaxian) that I've actually played and enjoyed. It leaves behind the generic space setting in favour of something much more abstract and interesting. The mechanic is novel and genuinely interesting. I'd hate to spoil the pleasure of playing it for the first time by explaining it. You know what to do.



Ah, Cave Story how is it that thou art so good and age so well? What is your secret?
The hushed, reverent tones that accompany any Cave Story discussion should be indication enough of its quality. It's a cult classic which plays similar to the metroid games and is being ported to wiiware soon. Get it while it's still free.



Iji may take itself a little too seriously, story-wise, but it has a genuinely unique blend of pseudo-3D graphics, action, stealth and role-playing elements. Again, similar to the metroid series but at the same time nothing like them at all. The graphics work brilliantly and are really hard to describe, but they make every action uniquely satisfying.



Every single one of Nifflas' games (this includes Knytt, Knytt Stories and Within A Deep Forest). They're nearly as revered among indie gamers as Cave Story. They're all somewhat akin to an environmental tone-poem; Pixel dreamscapes, ambient electronic music (the music is actually superb) and (by and large) a complete lack of fighting. The gaming equivalent of herbal tea and Enya.



If you like pulpy, trashy comic books as much as i do play Masq. It's an interactive, decision-based graphic novel, which also happens to be rather well drawn and written. I can't say much about it for lack of experience (stemming from a lack of time), but from what I've played it's a unique experience.




TRILBY: The Art Of Theft does stealth right, which makes for a nice change. It's akin to a simplified, arcadey Metal Gear Solid or Splinter Cell, but it's much more fun than either of those games. It was made by Yahtzee, famous for his Zero Punctuation videos. It turns out he's a very accomplished games designer.



I Fell In Love With The Majesty of Colours is a short-form game (seriously, it takes about five minutes to complete) that i played for the first time this morning. It's worth it for the initial revelation alone, and it requires very little skill/effort. It's an interesting study in moral choices.



I hope they give you as many hours of enjoyment (and procrastination) as they have me. Something to occupy a lazy Sunday afternoon with at any rate.

I'm in the midst of a fully-featured guide to indie games for The London Student, so expect a more comprehensive post on the topic in the near future.

Now I'm going to try really hard not to link to this...damn.