Fortress of Perpetual Midnight

Since Thursday was my one night off, I stopped by the other side of town yesterday. Unfortunately, I had not realized that it was the release date of 4th-Edition D&D, so the clerk at the desk immediately asked me, "Have you gotten your books yet?" I made the mistake of telling the truth: that I had gotten a better deal elsewhere, which of course didn't make him and Carlos happy. They made fun of me for the fact that my copies hadn't been delivered yet. I neglected to mention (as a comeback, one of my principal weak points) the fact that, as over the last few months the Wizards have revealed more of their master plan to tell repeat customers to go to hell (as mentioned here), I wouldn't be buying them at all if I weren't intending to use them to save more than the money I paid for them.

Due to the fact that 4th Edition is trying its darnedest not to be D&D, there's also the problem of the theoretical chance of publishing my campaign setting. I have no intention of retconning it to the point of being 4th-Edition-friendly, so the only chance I would have of using the d20 System or something similar is if someone else ends up producing the books and allowing them, such as the Pathfinder RPG. The reason for this is that the d20 System requires you to note on each book that it requires the 3rd-Edition or v.3.5 Player's Handbook, which Wizards will obviously be discontinuing if they haven't already. The Pathfinder RPG is designed to allow people to continue to use v.3.5-compatible materials, so it would work with that, but I don't know whether they'll allow me to actually tell people to use it. I could instead use the OGL, but that would require publishing my own basic materials. Since this was designed as a D&D setting, that would mean either (a) repeating pretty much the same stuff that's in the Player's Handbooks and Pathfinder RPG or (b) changing the setting so that those have something original worth printing as well. The latter means completely reworking the setting, which may be a good thing considering that it's not very original so far, but it defeats the purpose of publishing something I've already developed if I have to go back and start from the ground up. Of course, the chances that I'll ever have the resources (money and name recognition) to do this are rather slim.

By the way, on the topic of the subject line, DUNKIN' DONUTS® CMs have nifty tunes, but the first two* have really dumb lyrics. The "doing stuff" one is pretty self-explanatory (as is the issue with this one, the one for which it's not the creators who are stupid), but as Ms. Maelwaedd noted, it's an odd strategy to tell customers, "We understand your idiocy and provide for it!" The thing about this is, as with every spoken language except English (as far as I know), French and Italian have simple, consistent rules for how every word is pronounced. (lokodraucarn once tried to defend his mispronunciation of "coup de grâce" by saying, "I took German and Russian! No silent letters!" Yeah (again, a very belated comeback), I took Spanish and Japanese. That doesn't stop me using an American English dictionary. When I play a game where I have to vocalize a term often, it makes sense to know how to pronounce it and what it means.) A more common problem is trying to figure out which language the word is, but that's often easy, too.

*As usual, I tried looking for the videos to illustrate, but apparently now Google™ Video BETA doesn't index them anymore and instead has hardcore pornography openly displayed. (YouTube had both.) I never got that before.

As was the case with Spanish back when I thought I knew it, I'm planning also to publish official Japanese versions of my projects. (Of course, as I've noted here, my first one might be a bit heavy on the English even in the Japanese version.) I'm far from fluent, of course, but this way I can provide translations that are much truer to the author's intent than most. The expanded exposure this should provide would also give me a chance to come into contact with people who are fluent, which means I could have a chance to actually learn the language, and perhaps impose on someone to correct my work. (I think I'd have more trouble bothering to make the rest of the appropriate site bilingual to cater to these people.)

Another thing that I've pondered at times is that, since I'm going to have to learn to draw anyway, it would be really nifty if someday I could get one of my works published in my belovèd YuriHime S (not the main Comic YuriHime, as I don't imagine I'll ever manage to write works appropriately feminine or comedic for there—with Ms.? Natsuneko's work there, I might have hope, but it's nothing compared to Picard's, as I'll note later). If I did manage to achieve widespread popularity as noted above, they might let me do it cold turkey, but the more likely way is through the Ichijinsha Comic Taishō （「大正」ではなくて「大賞」） or other yomi-kiri (the comic equivalent of a pilot episode). The problem with that is that, as I've no doubt mentioned before, I don't think of many good one-shot ideas lately, as I'm so absorbed in crafting intricate webs of full-sized projects. (Even Project Cow Level, which was pre-planned to be a short, simple "practice" project, is expected to run to about one graphic novel's worth.)

And yet, oddly enough, I happened to think of an interesting one-shot idea yesterday. Although it relies on a lot of tropes, it has a major setting element that I haven't seen used for this before, and unlike some, the premise is distinctly yuri, not just a romance that happens to be between two ladies. (Oddly enough, the unusual setting for a yuri story may have caused me to have a dream last night about sleeping with a man (don't remember for sure). If so, at least I was the seme. . . .) Of course, as a short story, it doesn't have much to reveal without actually writing it, and I'd rather keep the good parts to myself just to avoid anyone else stealing them. (Yes, that's my delusions of grandeur talking again.)

If this somehow did come to pass, there's the problem that the format only allows 400 characters of commentary, much less than I'd normally use. I'd probably put most of it (and the official English translation) on the Web as a supplement to the published part, as Ms. Miyahara does. For the actual printed version, I'm thinking the essentials are along the lines of 「男で申し訳御座いません。いつか必ずレディーにもよろこんで頂けるまんがを描ける様になりますから、今は違った味でがまんして下さいませな。」 (although I haven't bothered to boot up Word to get a character count).

The "chigatta aji" bit overlaps with the question of how predisposed these Japanese folks will be to publishing stuff by some American git. I can't do much about that, but I might consider working in a more Japanese style than my own. For some reason, it seems to be coming out with a larger-than-usual proportion of pseudo-comical elements despite the fact that I don't have a sense of humor (perhaps to make up for the fact that romance is an alien concept to me), so it'll be an outlier in my portfolio in more ways than one (hey, more dovetailing with the post subject).

By the way, in the excessively megalomaniacal mōsō situation that I actually got to do a serial, Project AnthraXX seems at this point as if it would actually be palatable. Of course, it would be helluva Webcomic time in a quarterly mook. . . .

As if I weren't busy enough with my application and more equipment training, apparently the stress caused my mind to wander, because I suddenly stumbled upon another really stupid coincidence (or Freudian slip?) that I should have noticed long ago. As you know, I have two projects that are set in a setting closely based upon the real world. You may not notice because of the omissions, but there are exactly three native Japanese characters among the many dozens of characters I'm currently developing for those two projects. And all three are lesbians.

「今さら何ほざいてんだてめえ」とは言われそうだから言っておくが・・・*

As noted in the first paragraph of the previous link, I don't write lesbian stories. I write yuri. Judging by the notes I'm keeping in my head, of those many dozens of characters, those are the only three lesbian-identified individuals I have planned. So how the hell did this happen? To tell the truth, in all three cases, I just made them Japanese because of the names I thought up for them. (It's not as much of a coincidence as it might have been, as the two from Project AnthraXX are connected in terms of their background.) As noted in the disclaimers, I don't have any intentions of perpetuating stupid stereotypes (even ones I accidentally made up myself), and I certainly didn't do this on purpose. It just goes to show that I don't pay much of any attention to how my projects end up looking, which means I'm just going to get even more flak as I release any of this stuff. I really need to look more carefully at these things before they are (hypothetically) published.

Meanwhile, as with the other night, I'm putting myself on a slippery slope trying to bring up half-remembered lines off the top of my head and using them as post subtitles. I've read both of those at least half a dozen times, but they're really dipping into the archives; I'm not sure if I've even opened either volume in several months, much less read those chapters. At least one of them I plan to check at some point to corroborate something else I vaguely remembered, so hopefully I'll use that opportunity to correct myself. Being obsessive-compulsive is rather dumb sometimes.

*Yeah, another line that I'm too lazy to try and figure out how to say in English. It's not terribly important to the so-called flow of my blabbing, so those of you who can't read it don't need to feel left out.

Edit (2008.05.03): Fixed vowel length and punctuation in the quote

Wikipedia is an important source of encyclopedic information for me, as I know no other reasonable resource for information on Japanese topics in general. Sources in English are very unreliable, particularly in the case of popular media, where information is generally based on one to three crude translations, all with parts deliberately changed from the original meaning for various reasons. There are two main problems with it as compared to Wikipedia: that the contributor base appears much smaller, resulting in less information and much less discussion; and that they have very few images, possibly due to more strict enforcement of licensing.

However, I just found something very useful on a page I where I was doing a bit of research: a spoiler hide box. I have always found that part of the fun of series is the thrill of wondering what's going to happen next. That's why I've always been irritated by the fact that, in most cases, almost the entire English article was under the "spoiler warning" tag. The argument has been made that if you haven't already seen/read it, there's no reason to read the article, but that isn't true for me. The fact is, I usually have no idea whether there is any other place for information on a series other than reviews, fan material, and publication data. If people are kind enough to tag the spoiler parts individually, the reader has the option of whether or not he wants to spoil any particular part, and this system just makes it even more convenient.

So, I dropped by the English site to see if they had a tag like this, and I found that they've changed the policy: although there is still a tag, the discussion claims that you are now not even supposed to tell people if there's a spoiler. I find this even more disappointing, not just from a user's point of view, but as a contributor as well. I thought that if my projects reached the status of notability, I'd just rely on the Wikipedia article for the list of background information, as there'd be one anyway, so I could wait for other people to write what they felt was necessary, and I could personally oversee it to correct any mistakes. But if they feel that all spoilers are required to be included without notice, it doesn't fill that need, so there'd have to be one somewhere else with a different policy. That would be a pain in the ass, because I've seen that small wikis have little exposure and less people to edit them, and each one has to write its own set of policies (although cut-and-paste would work for the basis) and get the contributors to learn it in addition to those from other wikis for which they contribute, which may be very similar but differ in a few key points. I suppose we could say, "The rules are the same as Wikipedia, except ____," or something.

Edit (2008.05.03): I forgot that Comic Genesis has its own wiki, and upon closer inspection, it doesn't have that problem, so I don't have to worry about it as long as I use them and they don't change that policy. It also has a built-in rating system.

My readership appears to be at an all-time high (apparently at least two regulars!), but I've accumulated quite a lot of stuff during its absence, to say nothing of my sloth and the fact that I've built up a lot of new things due to year's-end-and-beginning splurging. So, I'd like to see if you have any requests or suggestions. What I've got in the works is as follows:

( Ridiculously long notes )

Typing of posting on daily_yuri, I happened to find a torrent of the only MY OTOME comic version that doesn't have the main character as a drag queen with a harem. (I still somewhat regret having bought Satō's entire MY HiME series, considering what he did with Tate, Ms. Kuga, and Ms. Fujino—although seeing Ms. Suzushiro and Ms. Kikukawa in a mutually open relationship (or am I reading too much into that?) was rather nice.) That means I have plenty of digital stuff to post, but since I already have it on order anyway, I decided to wait until it arrives so I can read it more conveniently. Of course, there is the fact that it seems weird to post pages from comics there, since it gives people various spoilers and out-of-context chunks of text, so I'll probably just be posting a few stand-alone pictures. (Hopefully, photobucket won't mind the hot-springs one, as it technically doesn't have nudity （ギリギリだがな） by my definiton, and one of my colleagues (figuratively speaking)' albums proves that they don't censor everything.)

I'm also planning on providing a bonus supplement to my next post here, but that'll have to wait, because I've already reached the title quota.

Edit: Come to think of it, the subject line here is a counterpart to the (spoiler that I've already posted many times before) unique status of Ms. Kuga and Ms. Fujino in the show. Being a HiME was somewhat cheapened in the comics, but Ms. Suzushiro and Ms. Kikukawa are the only example shown, if (partially suppressed) memory serves.

In case you couldn't figure it out on your own, the reason I bought Xenosaga was that it was the closest I could find to a yuri-themed game for a system I had (the fact that I accidentally bought it for the wrong system notwithstanding). As it happens, PC games (of which I have seen many recommended) can be shipped overseas by amazon, but since I have no one to help me fix the text issue, I wouldn't be able to play them. In the end, it occurred to me that when I reinstall Windows, I could use a Japanese version. The Japanese use Roman letters and so on all the time, so hopefully compatibility would be better in that case.

I've updated my one-shots. It's too bad that I don't have players for any of them. I'm desperate enough that I might even be willing to GM at ERPL if I had the chance.

One of the main selling points to me for making these in the first place is the chance to try out various settings and elements. Towards that end, I tried to make sure to include various factions and the special abilities associated with them. Unfortunately, this also makes it more difficult for players. The rules are not too much of a problem (even though in D&D and STAR WARS you have to make reasonably high-level characters to get access to much of the interesting stuff), as I build all of the characters and locations myself. However, the characters from these factions are more difficult to role-play for people who know nothing about the factions or setting beforehand. I try to give them primers on what their characters are, but this can only go so far.

In Rokugan, this problem is accented by the fact that one of the design strategies for the setting was to emphasize the alien nature of the culture. Even with all the information given, there are unclear areas, and they are not intended to be filled by our common expectations about how society works. Because of this, my version is an amalgam of what it says in the RPG books that I have, the wiki, and my own concept of Japanese culture. Conveniently enough, I chose to center the PC parties on the two most liberal clans of the empire, as they allow more variety in interesting character concepts, but I still only thought of three for the latter, so I ended up throwing in a couple of Lions (the archetypal samurai clan). If I think of more ideas, or if I only manage to get three players, that may work out all right.

I also plan to throw in a primer on Japanese language (or as much as you keep when speaking English in a stereotypical Japanese setting) to help those who play in the Rokugan mods. As noted before, I've given real-life Japanese precedence over that in the official setting, as the latter really sounds stupid to anyone who knows any of the former. It's not a big deal, but I like talking about it, and there's an off chance that people on this list might actually be willing to discuss things with me. . . .

After I'd seen it as the featured setting in the 3rd-Edition Oriental Adventures, I jumped at a chance to get a sub-mint copy of an older book on Rokugan at a damn good price. (I never can resist a deal.) Well, I thought OA had bad Japango (counterpart to Engrish), but the AEG version puts it to shame. Just for laughs, let's see if you can understand any of the biggest chunk of text:

I don't even want to talk about the Japanese handwriting. . . .

Incidentally, it also occurred to me that one of my new tags, yōsei Nihon-go, is a self-referencing term. I intended it as a counterpart to wasei Eigo.

Meanwhile, I thought of making a one-shot set in Rokugan a while back, but now with the further information, it's starting to coalesce. More on that later . . .

For some reason, I was Ms. Kurogane (lower right here), except my advances on Ms. Mudō (upper left) were stepped up to the point that I would have preferred (stupid mainstream magazine serials . . .). We apparently were living in a dorm centered around a very tall square shaft with a (squared-off) spiral staircase, where I enjoyed jumping down the open center. I arrived home one night to find Ms. Mudō dressed in a French maid outfit (not the more conservative Japanese type she wore in Book 6, since this is Ms. Hayashiya's one work without cheesecake . . .), with the word "tsun-dere" (very appropriate for her, unlike most of my dreams about charas) tattooed(?) on her left leg. My comment on this fact elicited a typical response from the left side of the last panel of a chapter in the premier tsun-dere yuri series.

For some reason, I later went on to ride a large cartoon carnosaur on its escape from the paleontology museum/labo. I proceeded to jump long distances across campus. I also stomped the baseball team in true Mario/Yoshi style, claiming that yakyū was a worthless sport when compared to hoshi-tori, or some such. (A good proportion of the Tenchi Gakuen story arc was in Japanese. I don't know what baseball has to do with anything, as I don't remember it ever even being mentioned in the series, except in the hyōshi-ura for Book 4.

A complete change of pace put my(real?)self and my brother in an American neighborhood, perhaps one of the older ones near downtown. We were walking around in the streets doing something, but I don't remember what for the life of me.

I also finally realized that, since it inevitably gives free shipping for any lucky-number order, YesAsia.com is significantly cheaper than amazon. (Sadly, unlike some good ideas that I've had, that wasn't part of the dream.)

( ミカエル、一生の不覚 )